CORONA Main Coronavirus thread

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Vaccine-induced immune response to omicron wanes substantially over time
by NIH/National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
July 19, 2022

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Graphical abstract. Credit: Cell Reports Medicine (2022). DOI: 10.1016/j.xcrm.2022.100679

Although COVID-19 booster vaccinations in adults elicit high levels of neutralizing antibodies against the omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2, antibody levels decrease substantially within 3 months, according to new clinical trial data. The findings, published today in Cell Reports Medicine, are from a study sponsored by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health. The trial was led by NIAID's Infectious Diseases Clinical Research Consortium.

As part of a "mix and match" clinical trial, investigators administered COVID-19 booster vaccines to adults in the United States who had previously received a primary COVID-19 vaccination series under Emergency Use Authorization. Some participants received the same vaccine as their primary series, and others received a different vaccine. Investigators then evaluated immune responses over time. Results previously reported in The New England Journal of Medicine showed all combinations of primary and booster vaccines resulted in increased neutralizing antibody levels in the recipients.

In the new analysis, investigators report that nearly all vaccine combinations evaluated elicited high levels of neutralizing antibodies to the omicron BA.1 sub-lineage. However, antibody levels against omicron were low in the group that received Ad26.COV2.S as both a primary vaccine and boost. Moreover, immune responses to omicron in all groups waned substantially, with neutralizing antibody levels decreasing 2.4- to 5.3-fold by three months post-boost.

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The table above shows the COVID-19 vaccine combinations from the “mix & match” study evaluated in this report. Credit: NIAID

Omicron sub-lineages BA.2.12.1 and BA.4/BA.5 were 1.5 and 2.5 times less susceptible to neutralization, respectively, compared to the BA.1 sub-lineage, and 7.5 and 12.4 times less susceptible relative to the ancestral D614G strain. BA.5 currently is the dominant variant in the U.S.

The authors note that the findings are consistent with real-world reports showing waning protection against SARS-CoV-2 infection during the omicron wave in people who received a primary vaccine series plus a booster shot. Additionally, the immune response to omicron sub-lineages show reduced susceptibility to these rapidly emerging subvariants. The data could be used to inform decisions regarding future vaccine schedule recommendations, including the need for variant vaccine boosting.
 

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Newly developed vaccine offers superior protection against omicron variants
by Bill Hathaway, Yale University
July 19, 2022

Yale scientists have developed a novel omicron-specific mRNA vaccine that offers superior immune protection against two viral subvariants than standard mRNA vaccines.

The new vaccine, called Omnivax, increased neutralizing antibody response against the BA.1 and BA.2.12.1 omicron subvariants in pre-immunized mice 19-fold and eight-fold, respectively, compared with standard mRNA vaccines. The improved response against the BA.1 subvariant was reported June 6 in the journal Nature Communications. The results of the study involving the BA.2 subvariant were published July 19 in the journal Cell Discovery.

"While standard mRNA vaccines still offer protection against infection from new variants, their effectiveness wanes over time and was compromised due to immune escaping mutations in emerging variants," said Sidi Chen, associate professor of genetics at Yale School of Medicine and senior author of both studies. "We wanted to see if we could develop variant-specific vaccines that offer additional protection against emerging subvariants."

The experimental vaccines, developed in Chen's lab by a team headed by postdoctoral associate Zhenhao Fang, use engineered lipid nanoparticles to deliver mRNA to cells with "instructions" to create spike proteins from mutating variants, which the virus uses to attach to and infect cells. The presence of these foreign viral fragments prompts the immune system to create antibodies against the virus. The rapid mutation of spike proteins on the surface of the virus over time has created a parade of subvariants and enabled them to blunt the protection of earlier generations of mRNA vaccines developed by Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech.

The engineered lipid nanoparticle mRNA vaccines can be created quickly, researchers say. For instance, the BA.1 subvariant emerged in mid-November; by mid-December Yale researchers had developed a vaccine against the new strain. However, testing the efficacy of the vaccine in mice and a peer review of the study was not completed until February. By March, the BA.2 subvariant had taken hold as the predominately circulating strain throughout most of the world. The researchers then investigated whether the omicron variant vaccine maintains its superiority over standard vaccines against BA.2. The new vaccine has also boosted an immune response superior to standard vaccines in mice against this subvariant, researchers reported in the Cell Discovery paper.

"Although translating the new vaccine candidate from bench to bedside requires rigorous testing in human trials, these preclinical studies provide a comprehensive and unbiased evaluation of an omicron-specific vaccine candidate, which will hopefully fuel the development of next-generation COVID vaccines," Chen said.

In light of the rise of new BA.4 and BA.5 variants, which have become most common among COVID cases, Yale researchers are currently testing a new vaccine candidate against these variants in mice.

"We have a system in place to combat these emerging subvariants, but we need to adjust the system to respond more quickly to emerging health threats," Chen said.

Chen is affiliated with the Yale Cancer Center, the Yale Stem Cell Center, the Yale Center for Biomedical Data Science, and the Systems Biology Institute and Center for Cancer Systems Biology at Yale's West Campus.

Yale's Zhenhao Fang and Lei Peng are co-first authors of both papers. Chen is the corresponding author of both papers. Craig Wilen, assistant professor of laboratory medicine and immunobiology at Yale, is the co-corresponding author of Nature Communications paper.
 

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Nasal sprays will be essential to thwart variants, research confirms
by University of Virginia
July 19, 2022

Those widely available COVID-19 vaccinations keeping the majority of the population free from serious illness will not be enough to stop the spread of the virus and its variants, new University of Virginia collaborative research indicates.

Just as science has begun to suspect, the shots will need a boost from a nasal spray.

"Our data suggest that an intranasal vaccine-boosting strategy will be critical to protect people against emerging variants of concern," said Jie Sun, the Harrison Distinguished Teaching Professor of Medicine at UVA. Sun serves in the Division of Infectious Diseases and International Medicine and associate directs the University's Carter Immunology Center.

Published Tuesday in the journal Science Immunology, Sun and colleagues' research fully documents for the first time the underperforming immune response in the airways of people with COVID-19 vaccinations compared to those with natural infection.

The leading vaccines in public use are called "mRNA vaccines" because they take inspiration from messenger ribonucleic acid, the delivery system that facilitates biological replication. But the mRNA in the vaccines is not derived from a live virus. Instead, the molecule is synthesized in a lab to resemble an invader, enough so that the body can recognize the real thing in the future. However, with these vaccines, "the message" now appears to be largely confined to the blood.

Bloodstreams get strongly ramped up by the vaccine, while the mucosal linings experience moderate or little neutralizing antibody response, the study found.

"The omicron variant almost completely escaped neutralization by mucosal antibodies in individuals who received mRNA vaccines and in previously infected individuals," said Sun. "Our data showed that mRNA vaccination also did not induce sufficient tissue-residing cellular immunity in the airways, another arm of our immune system to prevent the entry of the virus into our bodies."

Only the bodies of unvaccinated patients who were seriously ill put up a vigorous fight against the virus in both their airways and their bloodstreams, the researchers found—a less-than-ideal way of achieving a united front.

However, a separate component of the new research provides hope that vaccinations will one day soon provide complete coverage.

Mice that were administered a nasally delivered vaccine originating from adenovirus, a relative in the family of cold viruses that expresses the spike protein found in COVID-19, demonstrated "robust neutralizing antibody responses" in combination with mRNA vaccine shots.

"The nasal vaccine provides a mucosal antigen boost to the pre-existing memory of T and B cells that direct immune response, resulting in higher cellular and humoral immunity," Sun explained.

The uptick was found not only in the bronchi of the lungs, but also as an improvement over the bloodstream's normal vaccinated response.

And the response was "effective against the ancestral virus as well as the omicron variant," he said.

The research further validates scientists' suspicion that greater immunity to the coronavirus can be developed starting where the virus first takes root, the mucus membranes of the nose—perhaps stopping it cold.

In humans, Sun said, "We think the robust antibody responses in the respiratory tract would neutralize the virus immediately upon viral entry when the individual contracts the virus, preventing the establishment of viral infection and subsequent passing of the infection to others."

Pharmaceutical labs are working on COVID-19 nasal vaccines, but to date, none has been approved for use. A spray would require a weakened version of the live virus. If the live virus is too weak, the spray won't work. If it's too strong, people will get sick and the virus will spread.

An adenovirus-based nasal vaccine has also yet to be approved for humans, mainly out of a fear of unwanted side effects. One of them could be Bell's palsy, a condition that causes muscle weakness in the face. A study found a possible connection after people were vaccinated with an influenza nasal vaccine specially formulated to create a stronger immune response.

"For a nasal vaccine, we do need to be more careful about the safety profiles," Sun said. "So I think we need a step-up trial from a mouse to human study in the U.S. A human trial has been performed in China already using nasal adenovirus spray, which suggests it is generally safe and can boost good immune responses, but mucosal immunity was not examined."

Sun and colleagues plan to follow up on their research. As the first team to investigate respiratory mucosal memory with COVID-19, they identified that the body's natural immune response to the virus caused permanent damage to the lungs in hospitalized, unvaccinated patients.

Their recent look at the immunized builds upon that research.
 

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Booster shots offset some of omicron's immune evasion tactics
by University of Washington School of Medicine
July 19, 2022

Although omicron subvariants of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic coronavirus have evolved to evade antibody responses from the primary COVID-19 vaccine series, a new laboratory study suggests current vaccine boosters may elicit sufficient immune protection against severe omicron-induced COVID-19 disease. The project assessed a comprehensive panel of vaccines available in the United States and around the world, as well as immunity acquired through previous infection.

The international research team was led by the lab of David Veesler, associate professor of biochemistry at the University of Washington School of Medicine in Seattle and an investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.

The findings are published as an Early Release paper Tuesday, July 19, in Science. The lead authors are John E. Bowen and Amin Addetia, both in the UW Medicine biochemistry department.

"The development of lifesaving vaccines is regarded as one of humanity's greatest medical and scientific achievements, which is exemplified by COVID-19 vaccines," the project team noted. The protective immunity generated by the primary vaccine series or prior infection has been severely blunted by omicron subvariants. A booster dose, regardless of the type of COVID-19 vaccine, brings neutralizing antibodies against all the omicron subvariants to appreciable levels, this latest study shows

The findings come at a time when the United States government is considering recommending second boosters for adults under age 50, due to rising infection rates and the enhanced transmissibility of omicron BA.5.

This study's results are consistent with other research evidence that a third vaccine dose expands existing memory B cells in our bodies specific for the surface protein mediating entry into cells (called the spike protein) of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic coronavirus, as well as inducing new memory B cells. This leads to production of antibodies with enhanced potency against the omicron subvariants.

Veesler started studying coronavirus infection mechanisms and antibody counteractions years before the COVID-19 pandemic. The team on this latest project consisted of infectious disease research physicians and scientists from UW Medicine, Fred Hutch Cancer Center, and research institutes in California, Argentina, Italy, Pakistan, and Switzerland.

As the COVID-19 pandemic overstays its appearance on the world stage, genetic variants of the causative virus, SARS-CoV-2, have emerged that are more transmissible, fitter, and more adept at avoiding infection-fighting strategies. The latest variant of concern, omicron, has greatly diverged from the ancestral SARS-CoV-2 strain. It consists of several sublineages, including BA.5, which is predicted to soon dominate globally by replacing other variants.

The researchers in this week's Science paper first examined the functional impact of the mutations in the omicron subvariants spike proteins—the machinery on the virus that both gives it its crown-like appearance and enables it to attach to, fuse with, and infect cells. They found that the ability of the omicron BA.5 spike to bind with its host receptor (ACE2) was more than 6 times stronger than the ancestral SARS-CoV-2 strain.

In contrast, all omicron subvariants were slower at the next major step after binding with the receptor: fusing with the membrane on the host cell. The stronger binding might help the subvariants compensate for their diminished capacity to fuse with the host cells, the scientists hypothesize.

The researchers then evaluated, in human plasma samples, the neutralizing activity, elicited by vaccines or by prior infection, against the various omicron subvariants. Some of the samples came from individuals who had COVID-19 very early on in the pandemic before vaccines were available. Only 5 of these 24 early-pandemic individuals had detectable neutralizing activity in their plasma against any of the four omicron sublineages tested. Even then, their response was very weak.

The researchers also evaluated the subvariant neutralizing antibodies elicited by vaccines produced by Moderna, Pfizer, Novavax, Janssen, AstraZeneca, Sinopharm, and Sputnik V vaccines. All vaccine primary series consisted of two doses, except for Janssen's vaccine which consisted of a single dose.

The researchers noted, "Overall, the data underscores the magnitude of evasion of polyclonal plasma neutralizing antibody responses for omicron sublineages." They added that there was "a subtle but consistently more marked effect for BA.1 and even more so for BA.4/5 compared to BA.2 and BA.2.12.1" The findings help confirm that the soon-to-be globally dominant BA.5 will be the most immune evasive SARS-CoV-2 variant to date.

Because of the rise in reinfections and breakthrough cases, public health officials in several countries recommended a booster dose several months after the initial vaccine series. Veesler and his team measured and compared the benefits of vaccine boosters on the plasma neutralizing activity against the ancestral SARS-CoV-2 virus as well as the omicron subvariants.

Based on their findings, the researchers observed, "The marked improvement in plasma neutralizing activity for subjects that received a booster dose over those that did not highlights the importance of vaccine boosters for eliciting potent neutralizing antibody responses against omicron sublineages." Thus, despite the high degree of omicron subvariant immune escape, added booster doses with currently available vaccines will likely offer strong protection against severe disease.

Additional preliminary observations from this study suggest that the time interval between immunizations with certain available vaccines may affect the breadth and strength of the virus neutralizing responses. The researchers also think that the availability of several different vaccines might help in creating a more robust cross-reactive cellular immunity against omicron subvariants.

To be prepared for the future evolution of the ever-changing SARS-CoV-2 pandemic coronavirus, the scientists on the project stressed the importance of remaining diligent in surveillance to detect new variants. They also called for repeatedly evaluating the ongoing effectiveness of current vaccines and sustaining efforts to develop and test new vaccines and new vaccine strategies against the pandemic coronavirus and other related viruses. Those might be present in animal reservoirs and poised for causing disease outbreaks. Such efforts might lead to what the scientists describe in their paper as "stronger, longer lasting or broader protection" against the entire contingency of sarbecoviruses.
 

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Q&A #18 : What would be your prediction for those who are both unvaccinated against COVID-19 and never previously infected?
By Geert Vanden Bossche
July 19, 2022

Extended question:
What would be your prediction for those who are both unvaccinated against COVID-19 and never previously infected? Let's say those of working age(20 - 55) in fairly good health.

Should they be worried about Avian Flu and Monkeypox, since they have not experienced an infection by SARS-CoV-2?
Are they at risk for serious illness from these more infectious (and future more virulent) SARS-CoV-2 mutants?

Answer:
It would be quite unbelievable that they didn’t get exposed to SC-2 given the high infectiousness of previously and currently circulating variants. Ideally, they should have their Abs tested (anti-S would be sufficient since they’re not vaccinated). They can also have their Abs tested against Flu. If all this is negative (which would point to poor activation of natural immunity), they can just take one shot of a live attenuated measles or mumps or rubella or varicella vaccine (or all together in one shot) to boost their innate immune response. (However, they should only do so if they got MMR(V)-vaccinated in the past. The better their innate immune status, the lower the likelihood they are going to catch severe disease from these viruses. But anyhow, for a person in good health, it is highly unlikely to develop severe disease from Monkeypox (as it is - for now(!) - not highly infectious) or from Avian Flu as they must at least have had contact with Flu viruses in the past and hence, have some ‘Flu-trained’ innate immunity.)

Unvaccinated can now largely forget about contracting severe C-19 disease as the next big mutation will most likely make the unvaccinated resistant to the virus. However, if they have not yet been infected at all by any of these highly infectious variants, they could still contract C-19 disease (before that new variant emerges) and become seriously ill (but not ‘severely ill’ as longas they are in good health with no comorbidities and predisposing factors). To avoid this, they should either prevent risky contacts (difficult) till the next variant appears (in my opinion, just a matter of weeks) or take Ivermectin orHCQ as soon as symptoms manifest (but not prophylactically).
 

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Q&A #19 : Some questions from a good friend
By Geert Vanden Bossche
July 19, 2022

Q 1
What are the mechanism(s) that (largely) bypass the innate immune system upon vaccination with non-replicating vaccines (like mRNA)? Is this simply because it is a localized injection that doesn't replicate/spread throughout other tissues and organs? Or is this due to additives in mRNA vaccines that prevent innate immune stimulation in order for the mRNA itself to not be degraded before being absorbed into target cells?

A 1
Only replicating virus will present virus-derived (self-mimicking)motifs/patterns (on the surface of infected cells) that can be recognized by innate effector cells (NK cells).

Q 2
Why does C19 vaccination in young children prevent training of their innate immune systems for recognizing other viruses that they would later encounter? I understand how specific Abs can outcompete innate antibodies for a given virus, but why would specific Abs for SARS-CoV-2 Spike outcompete innate antibodies for something like influenza?

A 2
Because innate Abs bind to all glycosylated viruses. Although innate Abs can recognize a myriad of viruses, these very same viruses will require (self-mimicking) pattern recognition by NK cells to be recognized later on. It is through this pattern recognition mechanism that NK cells can be trained more specifically for the pattern presented by a particular virus (but which has reasonable homology with self-mimicking patterns presented by other glycosylated viruses).

Q 3
Can you elaborate on this pattern recognition?

A 3
Innate Abs are typically polyspecific! They recognize self-like surface-expressed sugar patterns. In the case of enveloped glycosylated viruses, those are of course derived from the infected host cells (which provide the envelope of the virus!). This is why these sugar patterns are broadly shared amongst glycosylated viruses.
 

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Q&A #20 : The vaccinal Abs are Wuhan-specific. When you say they bind with more affinity to the virus than the innate ones, how does this happen if the spike has mutated such that ADEI is now occurring?
By Geert Vanden Bossche
July 19, 2022

Q
The vaccinal Abs are Wuhan-specific. When you say they bind with more affinity to the virus than the innate ones, how does this happen if the spike has mutated such that ADEI is now occurring? Do these Abs attach partially but strongly (or not) to the constantly mutating spike?

A
The higher affinity is explained by the specificity of infection-enhancing Abs (IEAbs) for spike (innate Abs don’t have this level of specificity). IEAbs bind to a site on the spike proteinN-terminal domain (S-NTD) which is conserved amongst all Sars-CoV-2 variants.So any further variants will simply boost them.
 

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Why You'll Need to Get COVID-19 Boosters Again and Again
By Akiko Iwasaki and Albert Ko
July 19, 2022 7:00 AM EDT

Several highly effective vaccines were developed at an unprecedented speed to combat the COVID-19 pandemic. During the phase 3 clinical trials, mRNA vaccines had vaccine efficacy of 9495% in preventing symptomatic infections. After the rollout, real-world evidence showed that the mRNA vaccines provided ~90% effectiveness against infection. Then came the variants. The wave after wave of new variants, with ever-increasing transmissibility and capacity to escape existing immunity, challenge the ability of vaccines to prevent infection and transmission. The effectiveness of a primary series of mRNA vaccines (two doses) to prevent hospitalization and death is also being chipped away by these highly immune-evasive variants. Vaccine-mediated protection became shorter-lived, especially with the emergence of Omicron variants.

People look at these data and wonder, what is the point of getting the vaccines if they will not prevent symptomatic infections, and the protection does not last? Well, to expect robust protection from just the primary series of any vaccines is unreasonable—and was always likely to be—but somehow society has placed too high a bar on what is considered an acceptable number of doses for COVID-19 vaccines. Instead, we need to understand that we’re going to be getting boosters in the foreseeable future, and to appreciate their benefits.

Vaccines against other infectious diseases are given in multiple doses. Many of our childhood vaccines require multiple doses—5 doses for (diphtheria/tetanus/pertussis), 4 doses (Haemophilus influenza type b, pneumococcal conjugate, inactivated poliovirus), or 3 doses (hepatitis B) are all commonly given before the age of 18 years. These doses are required and not considered optional to achieve immunity. In adulthood, many of these vaccines need periodic booster doses to maintain immunity. The influenza virus requires annual vaccination doses for all ages. Yet, people don’t complain about having to get their 60th dose of the influenza vaccine. We should think of COVID-19 vaccines the same way.

Why do we need booster doses? The primary series of vaccines kick-starts the immune response by engaging lymphocytes, white blood cells that detect specific features of the pathogen to expand in numbers and become instructed to eliminate the pathogen. Most of these cells disappear over time, except for a small subset of cells that are kept by the body for future use. These “memory cells” are responsible for long-lasting immunity against a given pathogen. What boosters do is stimulate these memory lymphocytes to quickly expand in numbers and to produce even more effective defenders. The booster also selects for B cells that can secrete antibodies that are even better at binding and blocking virus infection and spread.

The primary series can be thought of as the high school for lymphocytes, where naïve cells receive basic instructions to learn about the pathogen. Boosters are like a college where lymphocytes are further educated to become more skilled and mature, to fight off future infections. Periodically, these college graduates need refreshers by more booster doses given later in life. This is the case for all vaccines. Booster doses provide the immune system the education it needs to prevent severe diseases from infections.

COVID-19 vaccines also need booster doses for the same reasons. We need to educate, maintain, and improve T and B cell responses to prevent severe disease. Boosters provide significant benefits to people who received the primary series in preventing hospitalization and death. In the U.S. in April 2022, people older than 50 years of age who received no vaccine, primary series only (no booster dose), or one booster dose had 38 x, 6 x, or a 4 x higher risk, respectively, of dying from COVID-19 compared to those with two or more booster doses. During the Omicron-predominant period, the booster dose provided protection from hospitalization even in previously infected people, whether older (>65 years of age) or younger (<65 years of age). Among children and adolescents, a primary series (two doses) of vaccination was less effective in preventing COVID-19-associated emergency department and urgent care encounters during the Omicron wave compared to the Delta period. Immunity also decreases with time since primary vaccination. No significant protection was detected more than five months after a 2nd vaccine dose among adolescents aged 16–17 years. However, a third booster dose restored vaccine effectiveness to 81% in this age group. There is thus a clear benefit of a booster dose across a broad range of age groups studied to date.

Can booster vaccination be improved in the future? Absolutely. We need improved boosters that can provide more durable protection, are effective against variants we encounter moving forward, and do a better job of preventing infection and blocking transmission. For example, booster-induced immune protection wanes within 4-6 months during the current Omicron period. We need vaccine strategies that provide more durable protection. Boosters are now being developed to match the circulating Omicron variant BA.5, which should provide better protection than boosters based on the original strain. However, because of the rapidly mutating nature of SARS-CoV-2, going forward, we will need boosters that can provide coverage against not just the existing but future variants of concern.

Boosters that work against a wide range of SARS-CoV-2 variants, now or in the future, as well as against other coronaviruses that may cause future pandemics need to be pursued. Coronaviruses have made the jump from animals to humans multiple times in history which resulted in pandemics. Vaccines that can broadly protect against a wide range of coronaviruses will also prevent future pandemics. In addition, future boosters should be given as nasal spray vaccines to provide local mucosal immune protection, capable of reducing infection and transmission at the portal of entry for the virus, and reducing long COVID risk. Ultimately, we need booster strategies that can be more easily implemented worldwide and have higher acceptance and uptake rates to provide much-needed immune protection for everyone. An over-the-counter nasal spray booster can bring us closer to that goal.

Researchers and industry are furiously working on developing next-generation vaccines as they did with our current vaccines, which have saved more than 14 million lives during the pandemic. But for now, take the booster doses you are eligible to keep your immune system educated and up to date so it has the best chance of protecting you from COVID-19 in the upcoming winter season and so we can prevent the enormous loss of life we experienced last winter with more than 300,000 people dying in the U.S. from a disease that can be prevented by current boosters.


Iwasaki is the Sterling Professor of Immunobiology and Professor of Dermatology and of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology and of Epidemiology at Yale University School of Medicine

Ko is the Raj and Indra Nooyi Professor of Public Health and Professor of Epidemiology (Microbial Diseases) and of Medicine (Infectious Diseases) at Yale University School of Medicine
 

Heliobas Disciple

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View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wLyTAsoz6X0
Unstable endemicity
13 min 59 sec
Jul 19, 2022
Dr. John Campbell


Expert predictions rapidly fail, need always to keep up to date with the latest real world situation. Science must be constantly corrected to be consistent with external objective reality. Symptomatic covid https://health-study.joinzoe.com/data US https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2... Evolutionary driver Was Increased transmission advantage Alpha, Delta Now Immune escape Omicrons, BA.1 BA.2 BA.4/5 BA.2.75 Ability to reinfect even those recently vaccinated or infected Australian Health Protection Principal Committee https://www.health.gov.au/committees-... https://www.health.gov.au/news/ahppc-... Reinfections may occur as early as 28 days after recovery, People who test positive to COVID-19 more than 28 days after ending isolation due to previous infection should be reported and managed as new cases. BA.4 and BA.5 associated with increased immune escape, rates of reinfection rise among previously infected, and those up to date with their vaccinations Vaccination continues to be the most important protection against severe illness English school attendance 19% of secondary pupils absent, 8% of teachers off work NHS 6 July, 26,874 NHS staff off Acute and long covid Stephen Kissler, epidemiologist, Harvard https://www.theguardian.com/world/202... The way that the pandemic has played out and is continuing to play out is unexpected We’d expected strong seasonal wintertime patterns where you don’t see a lot outside those winter months I would’ve thought it would have reached a steady state by now It seems the opposite is the case Prof Peter Openshaw, immunologist, Imperial College London They are actually becoming more frequent, with one piling in on top of the other If we let nature follow its course, we will, reach some sort of equilibrium But it may mean coexisting at a lower level of overall health Prof Tim Cook, anaesthesia In many settings, Covid is an inconvenience now, rather than a threat to life, but it continues to have a significant impact in healthcare From a healthcare perspective, the pandemic is not over Adam Finn, professor, paediatrics, University of Bristol (UK’s Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation) We’ve more or less given up on the idea of mass immunisation to control the spread of infection. Vaccinating everyone every three months is just not feasible. Variant-proof vaccine Pan-coronavirus vaccine Nasal vaccine https://www.principletrial.org/news/t... favipiravir and ivermectin, still being studied in the trial.
 

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What Could It Be? "Unknown" Reasons Have All of a Sudden Become the Leading Cause of Death

The number of people who died in Alberta from unknown causes in 2019 was around 500.
In 2020, that number rose to about 1500.
But in 2021, nearly 3500 people died from "unknown" causes!
Del Bigtree: "The leading cause of death in Alberta, Canada, is 'We don't freakin' know!'"

1 min 38 sec

 

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The COVID-19 Treatment Conspiracy - How millions of lives were lost
13 min 41 sec
Streamed live 15 hours ago
Vejon Health

The most important COVID-19 breakthrough occured in June 2020 through the RECOVERY trial (Oxford) by identifying dexamethasone. What was the reason for not taking the next step? Could millions more lives have been saved?


MORE ON HIS SUBSTACK:


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The COVID-19 Treatment Conspiracy - How millions of lives were lost
Dr Philip McMillan
12 hr ago

This was a sin of omission to not complete the research question about the optimal dose of steroid to use in severe COVID-19.

RECOVERY Trial was the most important breakthrough in therapy using Dexamethasone for COVID-19, occurring in June 2020.


Link to publication in “The Conversation” >

The question is simple:

If Dexamethasone works for COVID-19, are there more effective steroids and what is the optimal dose?”

Why has it taken so long to recognise this important question and what has delayed implementing the research protocol for over 2 years?


Link to the proposed RECOVERY Trial news announcement (December 2021) >

Whilst appreciating the tremendous work to identify dexamethasone, questions need to be answered about delaying optimising treatment.
 

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Independent SAGE's Dumb "Seven-Point" Covid Plan
The three-point-plan from "Idiocracy" actually worked. SAGE Plan Won't.
Igor Chudov
11 hr ago

Many of my readers had one Covid a long time ago, or never had Covid, are not having another Covid so far, and may not realize how badly are things going in Covid-land in Europe and highly vaccinated areas of USA.

More than one out of 15 Brits is having COVID today (Jul 19, 2022). This is higher than ever before. An “unexpected” largest-ever wave of a yet-another variant Ba.5 is reinfecting highly-vaccinated countries one more time. Hospitals are strained, because sick, force-injected health care workers are staying home due to their Covid reinfections, and patients are hospitalized at record rates. Excess mortality is rising.



People are, naturally, becoming worried as they or their relatives have two-week-long bouts of Covid reinfections that do not feel mild to them and leave them exhausted. My own opinion is that we are on the verge of significant increases in overall mortality. I am quite worried about that.

Rumblings of discontent are appearing. The powers-to-be are wondering what to do.

So, the so-called “Independent SAGE” just came up with a “seven-point plan” to combat COVID. The plan is so spectacularly stupid that it reads like a parody. Here it is, from the British Medical Journal no less.



This plan is the product of supposedly the “best Covid minds”, the leading thinkers of UK science, whose recommendations influence UK policy. What did these minds produce? Let’s look.

They are proposing to do more of same!

The “clear and consistent messaging” is a theme of the pandemic, it relates to a bad idea that all officials should parrot one line during a so-called “emergency”, to avoid confusing the public. The result of this policy was a lack of independent thinking, as well as censorship of any dissenting voices, that led to groupthink. What message, pray tell, should such “clear and consistent messaging” convey? The seven-point plan?

The efforts to promote “vaccine uptake” are particularly laughable in July of 2022. Here’s how vaccine uptake looks in the UK:



Of special interest is a need to have a “clear long-term plan to address waning immunity and immune escape”. What they are saying is that they do not have such a plan. They merely want to have a plan, which they do not have, as of now.
The concept of “air filtration” refers to a sincerely expressed, but misguided idea that retrofitting buildings with “air filtration devices” will stop the pandemic. While I personally like almost all people who advocate it, I also recognize that it is largely futile, for many reasons having to do with physics and gas dynamics.

Air filtration that could effectively capture airborne virions, would need to turn over enormous volumes of air every minute, through the finest filters, continuously. This is not compatible with existing buildings’ HVAC systems. It would also cost a fortune in electric bills and create a lot of heat. I do not want to get into this discussion too much, but “air filtration” of that kind is not possible in most establishments or homes.

The “FFP3 masks” are obvious non-starters because of difficulties wearing them. Making the public wear such masks in 2022 is impossible.

The worst part of this proposal is the so-called “equitable global provision of vaccines”. This is a code word for bribing governments of poor countries into forcing their citizens to take “vaccines” that these wise but poor people refuse to take voluntarily. The countries with unvaccinated majorities are the future of humanity, in my opinion. They are largely at herd immunity precisely because they refused to vaccinate. Yet, Independent SAGE wants to inject them with non-working “vaccines” in the name of “equity”. Why?

The crazy “Independent SAGE” advisers are anything but sage, are actually stupid, and I am very sorry that they have been UK’s thought leaders since 2020.

Here’s a clip from “Idiocracy”. While it is funny, it shows President Camacho actually solving his country’s problem of dying plants, with his three-point plan of hiring the smartest person in the world named Not Sure. Not Sure figured out the problem and proceeded to stop using Brawndo to water plants.

Brawndo', which owned the FDA
, went bankrupt. The plants started growing, given clean water. Any parallels with the present?

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ig446isvXlI
4min 22 sec

P.S. Please do not think that I am badmouthing the UK by criticizing British Covid experts: Covid experts in the USA are so much worse and could not even come up with a “seven-point plan”. So there is no “USA Covid plan” that I could criticize.
 

Heliobas Disciple

TB Fanatic
(fair use applies)

are covid vaccines the superspread vector for omicron?
it's really starting to look that way
el gato malo
20 hr ago

i’ve spoken quite a lot about why leaky vaccines drive viral evolution to select for vaccine advantage. rolling out non-sterilizing vaccines is is terrible idea. it’s like only taking half your course of antibiotics and then wondering why MRSA is suddenly everywhere. it’s just a selector for resistance and advantage. the basic mechanism is really very simple:
antigens that were recessive become dominant in order to evade the fixated immune response generated by an inoculant that did not work to stop colonization, carriage, and contagion.

this is the simple, predictable, and inevitable outcome of herd level antigenic fixation whereby most people are all locked into the same increasingly ineffective immune response and fail to generate new responses when faced with novel pathogens. this gets called OAS/hoskins effect.

it’s also how you get a throwback variant like omicron which did not descend from delta but looks to be a second serotype whose last common ancestor with D was pre-alpha. it was a going nowhere failed mutation that lacked evolutionary fitness. but then the world changed and vaccines selected for omicron. it’s just simple evo pressure that works like this.

and it looks to be intensifying rapidly. since the emergence of omicron and especially of some of its later sub-variants, particularly the BA series, there has been dramatic change in viral behavior.

we saw the canary in the covid mine in the UK where risk rates were blowing out and even as they switched to “3 dose boosted” to measure relative effect, the fact that risk rates were not only higher in the vaxxed than unvaxxed, but rising fast over time became unavoidable.



covid was already vaccine advantaged, but was rapidly becoming more and more so. full data HERE.

notoriously, this led the UK to discontinue reporting of this series. it appeared they suddenly did not want to talk about this anymore. but it’s cropping up everywhere.

it can now be seen in UK all cause deaths data.

we also saw it in some US hospitalization data.

and in the data from israel.

this set me to wondering where else we might test this theory that “more injection = more infection,” especially with new variants.



the timeframe for investigation was easy to pin down so we have the makings of a testable hypothesis:

if these variants are more vaxx enabled, we’ll see more rise in prevalence in places of high vaccination.

if this prevalence is swamping the lower virulence of the variant, we will also see a rise in severe outcomes (because 4X cases at 1/2 severity is still 2X the number of severe outcomes)

so here we go:

i reached out to longtime gatopal™ and noted datahawk ben to get a look at some US data that he is far better at automating and slicing than i.

the results were extremely provocative.

first, we plotted the relationship between vaccination rates and covid case rates in 2021 from spring to mid summer:



we can see a mild association between vaxx and cases, but it’s nothing that screams “crisis.” r2 = 0.079
but look what happens in 2022 as vaxx rates are higher and the new omicron variants are dominant:



now the relationship between more injection more infection becomes pronounced. R2 is now quite high for such a noisy series at 0.484.

it’s the same timespan in the same states, so this should cause seasonal signals to mostly cancel out.

i think we’re seeing a strong vaccine signal here and the highly vaxxed states are tallying on the order of twice the total covid counts based on about a 25 percentage point difference in vaccination rate.

that’s a massive signal and starts to align ominously with some of the UK data. if 25% of your people get 4-5X the infection rate, that roughly doubles the overall rate of infection, which is just what happened. this is more than a bit provocative.

cases are a tough metric to work with for a great many reasons and so i then sought to find further validation of what was going on. this led me to the data from healthdata.gov. the data is, to put it kindly, disordered and dumping it into csv and thereby to excel and doing this by hand is time consuming (and i’d love to find a way to automate it if someone has the time/chops) so i just pulled one state of particular interest because it’s big, has enough data, has been widely watched, and i know it to be representative of what’s going on in many others: new york.

i chose hospitalization rates among the old as a metric because it’s a severity measure and the vaxx rate there is now near total in NY.

it’s obvious just from the NYT chart that this year does not look like last year. things were going well, but then in march/april, the trend reversed and we got a dramatic departure from past seasonal signals.



the chart above uses the healthdata.gov data, so i pulled that data and ran the series (in absolute numbers, not per 100k)
we can see “this was going better and then it suddenly wasn’t” very clearly if we overlay the years.



and it’s even more pronounced in 80+



to make this easier to see i calculated the year on year change in hospital admissions (and applied a 7 day moving avg for smoothing).

something reversed in late march/early april and by late april it was really taking off.

that’s right when the BA sub variants hit. note that these are also the same variants that caused a near step function rise in the UK as can be seen in the chart above.



it was worse in 80+



this is, of course, exactly what one would predict if the driver is antigenic fixation: new variants make the effect pronounced and it expresses most highly in those most dependent on antibodies because their generalized immune systems are weaker.

(a caveat: some seasonal variability (like early summers) may account for some of this yoy rise just based on comps to very low prior season so as we start to compare vs summer peak from last year, the % will likely (and hopefully) drop. but even at 200-400% elevation instead of 700-1400%, that’s still very, very bad.)

as one final issue: look at the overlap of vaxx and hotspots within NY



this association just keeps cropping up everywhere. it’s in the german data too.



and europe as a whole:

Image

graphic from dr claire.

i wish i had better news, but this signal is prolific.
  • cases in NY are ~10X what they were this time last year. no way that’s “early summer” or “sample rate.” it’s a massive change in infection profile.
  • covid hospital admissions are 4X a year ago and ICU doubled. deaths, while low, are roughly 3X last year same time.
  • overall US case count for 7/17/22 is 130k vs 32k last year, hospitalized is 41k vs 24k and deaths are 420 vs 270. (all 7 day mvg avgs)
all of this is strongly consistent with the idea that we have a much milder variant that is still producing a greater number of severe outcomes because the case count is so much higher and this case count is being driven by the vaccinated, not the unvaxxed. their risk ratio for catching covid looks to be 3-5X higher.

this is the outcome no one wanted/everyone hoped against. alas, reality is not optional and the reality is that this was entirely predictable because this is how evolution works. it’s why we do not use leaky vaccines. the herd level antigenic imprinting suck drugs produce becomes an evolutionary selector and the outcome will always be this (unless, like flu, the vaxx is so ineffective and the pathogen so variable that the imprinting is too wide of the mark to fixate).

your immune system becomes a one trick pony and the virus learns to trick the pony and spread like wildfire.
that’s nature for you.


this pattern is all over the US states and far more pronounced in the high vaxxed than the low.

how this ball bounces next is not easy to call with precision, but in general, i’d expect the omicron sub variants to become ever more vaccine advantaged, the risk ratios to stay elevated and possibly rise further, and for durable covid immunity among the vaxxed to remain elusive, especially in those with weaker general immune systems (mostly, the aged).

boosters seem to be making it worse and evidence that variant specific boosters will provide efficacy is absent. tests of such have shown them to be ineffective and this stands to reason: if the actual virus cannot overcome vaxx induced OAS it’s unlikely a vaccine can either.

i take no joy in this hypothesis gathering such compelling evidence and keep trying to falsify it because, frankly, i’d sleep better.

but the data is what the data is. so we must follow it.

please keep the ideas for and insight into these analyses coming.

will keep at this.
 

Heliobas Disciple

TB Fanatic
(fair use applies)

Australia, once held as the example of the best response as they slandered USA; waves were not getting back to baseline (see 1st graph); now look, surging Omicron cases. how? they had best lockdowns!
What happened? they locked down like Canada & China too long & hard & suffered & killed their economy & people; in wait of a failed vaccine that drives infection; why? no background natural immunity!
Dr. Paul Alexander
3 hr ago

Lockdowns and vaccines have failed for Australia!!! Their ZERO-COVID has failed! Same is and will happen in New Zealand. As is happening in China now with the catastrophic ZERO-COVID policy. See Austria.

Three key failures include:

1) underestimation or failure to consider the evolutionary capacity of this virus to adapt or evolve to the pressures placed on it; the sub-optimal vaccinal immune pressure on the spike is a critical rate limiting step; not just vaccine, but all lockdown policies

2) failure to approach COVID and the vaccine inclusive of both the virus and the host immune response; an evolutionary ecosystem between virus and host immune response; the pressure placed by the immune response (sub-optimal) on the target antigen

3) failure to understand that it is the non-neutralizing induced vaccinal antibodies (an imperfect ‘leaky’ vaccine) and NOT the virus, that is driving the variants and surges in infections and in the vaccinated; the antibodies bind to the virus yet does not neutralize it, and in so doing, increases infectiousness of the virus to the vaccinee (ADEI)

I beg the Australian government to listen: boosters are not the answer! Stop the mass vaccination, stop now and do not, under no circumstance, vaccinate your children with these vaccines. The COVID vaccinal antibodies are high-affinity and specificity for the target antigen (the spike binding sites) while the innate antibodies that are being trained in childhood, are low affinity, poly-specific. The vaccinal antibodies will outcompete the innate antibodies and bind strongly to the spike and subvert, sideline the innate antibodies from binding and it needs to bind to be trained and instructed, and in being blocked and not trained, this prevents education of the innate immune system for later on in the child’s life to recognize other viruses and ‘self’ of the child from the ‘non-self’. Auto-immune disease is the result.

Open up Australia now, fully, with strong protections of the vulnerable and allow the rest of the low risk population to live largely normal lives. Use vitamin D and use early treatment as needed.

They did not allow their populations to develop natural background immunity, even a little bit. Locked down too long and hard. So now as infectious clade BA.5 comes through, they are susceptible as an entire population. No where to run. With a vaccine that is non-neutralizing and driving infectious variants and infections in the 95% vaccinated population, and now driving hospitalizations and death in Australia.

In short, they fell for it and have failed!

Mass vaccination after excessive lockdowns with no natural immunity as a buffer, using a non-neutralizing vaccine in the midst of a pandemic with high infectious pressure and sub-optimal mounting immune pressure on the target antigen.
The deaths are happening in vaccinated Australians. They failed! They were too stupid, the inept government, to listen to us!

Excess mortality due to the vaccine and due to the failure to treat sick people during the harsh lockdowns and now they are acutely ill and dying. That’s the excess mortality.











 

Heliobas Disciple

TB Fanatic
(fair use applies)

South Africa (SA): has trained innate immunity (antibodies) especially in young children (less VAXX) saved them? even against Centaurus BA.2.75 sub-variant? look at the recent wave, back to baseline
Did India blink with so much vaccine? undercutting innate & it's natural immunity? IMO, 1st blush, SA may have benefitted by less VAXX, allowing it's children/young people INNATE & it clears out virus
Dr. Paul Alexander
15 hr ago

It’s the vaccine, stupid, NOT the virus, that is causing the sharp increases in infections, and they are happening in the vaccinated.

I am in two minds now, as I am not sure if the public health people at CDC and NIH and WHO and even the vaccine people like Moderna (Bancel) or Pfizer (Albert Bourla) are just genuinely stupid and inept, purely corruptible and easily bought out, or are pure evil. I think it is the latter. Maybe some of all but the latter describes them to me now. They cannot be that stupid. These graphs tell a clear story, IMO.

Looks like Africa will win COVID and this fraud vaccine issue in the end!

I am trying to make sense of the graphs for the data and graphs are telling us a story. I am writing at a 50,000 foot level and not getting into the immunology and cell biology etc. Just making some initial observations on data today. Driving some debate.

I know you guys and gals here are very in tuned and smart enough to know more than the scientists out there, I have learnt this. I am so proud and inspired by people who are ‘thinking’.

The most precious GOLD standard immunity today belongs to a child in US or Canada or elsewhere that has not had the COVID injection and over 2.5 years, their innate immunity has been allowed to train, exposed to pathogen and COVID, and the innate antibodies doing what they do so well, that is sterilize the virus. The acquired -adaptive immune system also to some extent can sterilize the virus.

Early to tell the impact of BA.2.75 in India but India may have backed itself into a corner with the vaccine, even if not the mRNA platform. They were doing so well with a young base population and early treatment and preventive prophylaxis.
Let us see but as you see in the graph below as of today I plotted, there is a blip increase. Let us see if this is idiosyncratic or a steady rise.

All high ‘vaccination rate’ nations now have surging infections as Vanden Bossche and Yeadon et al. have been saying, what I have been saying….the COVID vaccine that generates the spike (regardless of delivery platform or how it get’s made) with its greater vaccinal induced antibody specificity and binding affinity (high-affinity) for the spike antigen, is outcompeting and subverting the natural innate and acquire-adaptive antibodies (for the binding sites on the spike) that could sterilize the virus yet is being blocked. The induced vaccinal antibodies actually causes massive infection in the vaccinated.

It is not the virus that is more infectious, it is the non-neutralizing vaccinal antibodies that do not sterilize/neutralize (stop infection or transmission) the virus yet still bind to the spike, that is giving the virus the greater infectious property, to the vaccinee. The result is antibody-dependent enhancement of infection (ADEI) as well as antibody-dependent enhancement of disease (ADED); some call it antibody mediated viral enhancement (AMVE).

Importantly, the vaccinal antibodies subvert the innate antibodies for the binding sites on the antigen spike, and would present young children tremendous risk situations as their innate antibodies will not be trained and as such (blocked from binding to ‘live’ virus), the innate immune system would not be able to eliminate the virus the child is now confronted with, as well as a broad range of glycosylated viruses (shared similar sugars and patterns/glycans), and will be blocked from recognizing ‘self’ from ‘non-self’. This can be deadly to our children.

It is either the massive infectious pressure (circulating virus) has to be reduced (e.g. via anti-viral chemoprophylaxis) or the COVID vaccine must be stopped. Or people die in massive numbers. For in this disbalance, one of the three has to be reduced. We do not want the latter in any manner.

We continue to disregard the complex interplay between the virus and the host immune response and that it is the sub-optimal, immature, immune pressure from a leaky ‘imperfect’ vaccine that is causing the surges in infection, NOT the virus. The virus does not have this property.

And we argue we are placing selection pressure on the viral virulence now to the extent that we can drive the emergence of not only an infectious clade but a virulent lethal one. Humanity can be threatened if this failed fraud COVID injection is not stopped. Not even a ‘coming’ bi-valent vaccine (with a Wuhan and BA.4 and BA.5 spike) will work for it will once again be vaccinating into a pandemic (very different than vaccinating outside of a pandemic) with massive infectious pressure and will not hit the then dominant clade at that time the vaccine rolls out. So again, it will drive immune pressure on the spike and thus more infectious variants to emerge. This pandemic will last 100 more years with these failed vaccines and this inept, illogical, reckless vaccine policy by CDC, NIH, FDA, Pfizer, and Moderna. These people know exactly what they are doing, in effect, dooming humanity.





SOURCE:

Centaurus BA.2.75











 

dstraito

TB Fanatic
Well it is my turn in the proverbial covid bucket!

I stayed in bed all day yesterday sure that I just had a bug. My Don't digital thermometer was on the wrong setting. Today I tested at 101.4 so I went ahead and did the home covid test. It was positive so we tested DW and she was positive as well. She can not work the rest of the week. That is not the way we wanted to get to spend more time with each other.

Well, it is day three. I am supposed to be feeling better by now, you know superior genetics and stuff(Apparently not).

Between coughing and gagging my ribs feel like I signed up tp be Mike Tysons body bag.

The worst part, my DW is on the same page and can' t dote on me. If it was just her, I would dote on her but everyone knows men are such babies( Her words, not mine)

I'll be totally ok by tomorrow

I do not feel.very well but better than yesterday. Nope, no vax.
 

Zoner

Veteran Member
just like Geert predicted.

WHO: COVID triples across Europe, hospitalizations double


LONDON (AP) — The World Health Organization said Tuesday that coronavirus cases have tripled across Europe in the past six weeks, accounting for nearly half of all infections globally. Hospitalization rates have also doubled, although intensive care admissions have remained low.

In a statement on Tuesday, WHO’s Europe director, Dr. Hans Kluge, described COVID-19 as “a nasty and potentially deadly illness” that people should not underestimate.

He said super-infectious relatives of the omicron variant were driving new waves of disease across the continent and that repeat infections could potentially lead to long COVID.

WHO said the 53 countries in its European region, which stretches to central Asia, reported nearly 3 million new coronavirus infections last week and that the virus was killing about 3,000 people every week.

Globally, COVID-19 cases have increased for the past five weeks, even as countries have scaled back on testing.

“With rising cases, we’re also seeing a rise in hospitalizations, which are only set to increase further in the autumn and winter months,”

Kluge said. “This forecast presents a huge challenge to the health workforce in country after country, already under enormous pressure dealing with unrelenting crises since 2020.”

Earlier this week, editors of two British medical journals said the country’s National Health Service has never before had so many parts of the system so close to collapsing.

Kamran Abbasi, of the BMJ and Alastair McLellan of the Health Service Journal wrote in a joint editorial that the U.K. government was failing to address persistent problems worsened by COVID, including ambulances lining up outside hospitals too overloaded to accept new patients.

They slammed the government’s insistence that vaccines have broken the link between infections and hospitalizations. Although vaccines dramatically reduce the chances of severe disease and death, they have not made a significant dent on transmission.

“The government must stop gaslighting the public and be honest about the threat the pandemic still poses to them and the National Health Service,” the editors wrote.

WHO released its fall strategy for COVID-19 on Tuesday. The U.N. health agency called for a second vaccine booster dose for anyone age 5 and up with weak immune systems, promoting mask-wearing indoors and on public transportation, and better ventilation in schools, offices and other places.

Kluge said Southern Hemisphere countries were currently experiencing a very active flu season that, combined with COVID, was straining health systems.

“We are likely to see a similar scenario in the Northern Hemisphere,” Kluge said, warning that increased pressure could lead to business, travel and school chaos.

He urged people to make their own decisions, even in countries where authorities have largely abandoned coronavirus restrictions.

“We’re all aware of the tools we have to keep ourselves safe, assess our level of risk and take the necessary steps to protect others if we get infected,” Kluge said. “Just because a mask isn’t mandated doesn’t mean it’s prohibited.”
 
Last edited:

Heliobas Disciple

TB Fanatic
(fair use applies)

Australia battles fresh Omicron outbreak as COVID deaths rise
by Renju Jose
Thu, July 21, 2022, 12:11 AM

SYDNEY (Reuters) - Australia reported one of its highest daily death tolls from the novel coronavirus on Thursday while hospital admissions hovered near record levels, as authorities struggle to get ahead of highly contagious Omicron variants.

The BA.4/5 variants are good at evading immune protection from vaccination or prior infection and have been driving a surge of new infections globally.

Australia is reporting the highest daily numbers since the first Omicron wave earlier this year, with 89 deaths from the coronavirus on Thursday and 90 on Wednesday. Just over 55,600 new cases were recorded on Thursday, the highest since May 18.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said state leaders and federal health officials have not recommended making masks mandatory in indoor venues, despite calls by some doctors to do so.

Australia avoided the high death tolls seen in other countries during the first waves of the pandemic thanks largely to high levels of public compliance with tough social distancing restrictions.

But there is little public appetite for a return to such measures to defeat the latest surge in infections and Albanese has resisted pressure from some health experts to impose mask mandates.

"It's no good having a mandate unless it's enforced," Albanese told ABC Radio.

He said health officials also had to take into account the effects of tough restrictions on mental health.

The latest Omicron wave is pushing the number of people with COVID-19 in Australian hospitals close to the peak hit in January. About 5,350 patients are in hospitals, and several states are battling record admissions.

Authorities have urged businesses to let staff work from home and recommended people get booster shots urgently, with only about 71% of the eligible population having received their boosters. About 95% of people above 16 have had two doses.

Since the pandemic began, Australia has reported about 9 million COVID-19 cases and 10,968 deaths.
 

Heliobas Disciple

TB Fanatic
(fair use applies)

Erie hospital leaders: Latest COVID-19 surge might not spark more admissions
David Bruce, Erie Times-News
Wed, July 20, 2022, 10:00 PM

Erie hospital officials are optimistic that COVID-19 hospitalizations, especially those requiring intensive care unit admissions, will not rise significantly this summer as yet another new omicron subvariant sparks a rise in new cases.

The BA.5 subvariant accounted for 41.1% of the COVID virus found in samples taken June 29 from the Erie Wastewater Treatment Plant and is now the most common COVID-19 subvariant found in the United States.

It is a highly transmissible and immune system-evading version of COVID-19, but early indications are that BA.5 won't cause a higher percentage of severe illness and death than other recent subvariants.

"BA.5 seems to be like previous omicron strains. It's highly infectious but less virulent," said Christopher Clark, D.O., Saint Vincent Hospital president. "Hopefully that remains the case."

The BA.5 subvariant of COVID-19 is highly transmissible but less virulent than earlier strains of the virus, said Saint Vincent President Christopher Clark, D.O.

Erie County's number of COVID-19 hospitalizations has remained surprisingly steady in recent months, even as case totals have risen and fallen. The 14-day moving average of daily COVID hospitalizations has remained between 17 and 33 patients since March 21, while the seven-day moving average of daily cases has fluctuated during that time between 9.4 and 109.9.

Many recent COVID-19 patients are admitted to the hospital for other reasons and subsequently test positive for the virus, said Emily Shears, vice president of quality for UPMC in northwestern Pennsylvania and New York.

"Even the COVID patients who come in because of respiratory reasons, every one of them right now (at UPMC Hamot) is either breathing room air or on very low levels of oxygen," Shears said Tuesday. "None of them are on ventilators."

Steady hospitalizations

Clark and Shears both said there are several reasons why COVID-19 hospitalizations haven't risen in recent months along with new case totals.

The omicron subvariants cause more upper respiratory issues, such as coughing and congestion, instead of serious lung problems like the earlier variants sometimes caused. There are also more people who have at least some immunity, either through prior infection, vaccination — almost 60% of county residents are fully vaccinated — or both.

"The most common trait we see in those who are very ill with COVID is advanced age, like when COVID first started," Clark said. "We also see them with chronic medical conditions."

The average age of a current Hamot patient with COVID is 66, nearly a decade older than it was during the delta surge in late 2021, Shears said.

Even if BA.5 is no more virulent than its predecessors, hospitalizations could rise if enough people get infected, said Charlotte Berringer, R.N., director of community health services for the Erie County Department of Health.

"If we see, say, a 300% increase in cases due to BA.5 and the hospitalization rate remains at 5%, it still means more hospital admissions," Berringer said. "It appears the sickest people are those who are not vaccinated and have no previous COVID infection. That's why it's still so important to get up-to-date on your vaccines."

Vaccinations surge in Erie County

Erie County did see an increase in COVID-19 vaccinations last week, especially among people getting their first and second booster shots.

The county health department reported 1,198 vaccinations the week of July 11-17, nearly the same number as were given the previous two weeks combined and the highest total since the week of June 6-12. Of those 1,198 shots administered, 56% were second boosters and 17% were first boosters, Berringer said.

"It may indicate an awareness of BA.5, which has been in the news so much recently," Berringer said. "The vaccine does a good job at preventing hospitalizations and death."
 

Heliobas Disciple

TB Fanatic
(fair use applies)

Vomiting is a tell-tale sign of BA.5 COVID infection in kids, a pediatrician says. Here are the other signs to look out for.
Hilary Brueck - Business Insider
Wed, July 20, 2022, 5:00 PM

  • BA.4 and BA.5 infections in children can look different than adults.
  • Gastrointestinal issues like diarrhea and vomiting can be a tell-tale sign of infection, especially in younger kids.
  • But fevers and sore throats are still the most common COVID symptoms, overall.
The most telling symptoms of a COVID-19 infection with variants BA.4 and BA.5 may not always look the same in young kids as they do in adults.

With the two Omicron subvariants BA.4 and BA.5 now responsible for an estimated 90% of US cases, it's safe to assume if your child has COVID, it is probably one of these highly infectious versions of the virus.

Dr. Julianne Burns, a pediatric infectious disease specialist at Stanford Children's Health in California, says that symptoms of COVID this summer haven't differed too much from what she saw with Omicron in the winter and spring.

"We've seen less loss of taste and smell," she told Insider. Instead, both kids and adults have been experiencing "cold symptoms, like sore throat, runny nose, cough," fatigue, fever, headaches, and body aches, she said.

But one major difference between kids and adults that Burns has noticed lately is that kids are experiencing more stomach issues with COVID than adults do — and sometimes these are the only tell-tale signs that youngsters are infected at all.

"Gastrointestinal symptoms can be more common in children," she noted. This is especially true in younger kids, who may have tummy issues as their most prominent COVID symptoms.

Gastrointestinal issues kids may experience with COVID include:
  • diarrhea
  • vomiting
  • abdominal pain
  • and loss of appetite
Other symptoms

Still, the most common COVID symptoms kids experience, overall, are quite similar to those of adults, and include:
  • fever
  • cough
  • congestion
  • and runny nose
Avoid people with common cold symptoms, experts say

Tim Spector, who runs the highly regarded Zoe COVID study in the UK, has been seeing the same trends as Burns has lately in data he collects on the most common COVID symptoms. These symptoms are reported by hundreds of thousands of people of all ages across the UK, via their smartphones:

top 20 symptoms covid jul 2022

Data current as of July 14, 2022.Zoe

Because some of the top COVID symptoms right now look a lot like a common cold, Spector suggests you "make sure you're in a well-ventilated place — don't go near anyone with cold-like symptoms, please," and wear a well-fitted mask when in public indoors to avoid catching and spreading the virus this summer.
 

Heliobas Disciple

TB Fanatic
(fair use applies)

BA.5 makes up nearly 80% of new COVID cases. Here's what to know about the subvariant.
Adrianna Rodriguez, USA TODAY
Wed, July 20, 2022, 1:14 PM

The BA.5 subvariant of omicron continues to dominate the summer wave of COVID-19 in the United States, making up nearly 80% of new cases, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Nowcast model.

In the most recent week, ending Wednesday, 29 states reported more cases than the week before, a USA TODAY analysis of Johns Hopkins University data shows. Twenty states had more deaths than a week earlier.

Hospitals in 35 states reported more COVID-19 patients, while hospitals in 25 states had more patients in intensive-care beds, according to Health and Human Services data.

Here’s what you should know about BA.5.

When did BA.5 start?

BA.5 was first detected in the U.S. at the end of April, experts said.

The subvariant was first seen in South Africa “but that doesn’t mean that it arrived (to the U.S.) from South Africa,” said David Dowdy, an epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Researchers can’t know where it came from due to limited surveillance.

The first cases appeared in the Northeast, then started spreading during the past month to southern, midwestern and western states, Dowdy said.

“It’s been sort of a slow rise since that time,” he said. “It’s taken about two months to get to the current state where we think BA.5 probably accounts for about two-thirds of all COVID cases, now.”

What does BA.5 stand for?

The World Health Organization uses the Greek alphabet as a classification system to simplify understanding and avoid stigmatizing countries where new strains of the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19 are first identified.

WHO named the original B.1.1.529 variant after the 15th letter, omicron. Within variants, the agency assigns numbers to its sublineages.

“These represent the numbers and types of mutations within that particular variant,” said Dr. David Weber, professor of medicine pediatrics and epidemiology at University of North Carolina, Chapell Hill. “It’s a way of knowing which variant they’re dealing with.”

BA.5 is still classified as an omicron variant but has new mutations that distinguish it from other omicron subvariants, such as BA.1 and BA.2.

BA.5 variant symptoms in adults, kids

Clinicians say many BA.5 symptoms are similar to those seen in previous variants, including congestion, headaches, cough and fever.

But children tend to have more gastrointestinal symptoms compared to adults, like nausea, abdominal pain, vomiting and diarrhea, said Dr. Claire Bocchini, an infectious disease specialist at Texas Children’s Hospital.

She’s also seen more cases of croup in kids, which the Mayo Clinic defines as an infection of the upper airways that obstructs breathing and causes a “barking” cough.

“Certainly this is an infection to pay attention to for parents of children because while most children don’t require hospitalization, a few do,” Bocchini said.

How long does BA.5 last?

While some people don't experience any symptoms with BA.5, experts say those who do can expect to feel sick for few days up to a few weeks.

“It varies on a wide spectrum,” said Dr. Mobeen Rathore, professor at the University of Florida College of Medicine and a member of the American Academy of Pediatrics committee on infectious diseases.

Bocchini said the normal course of illness is “one to two weeks of acute symptoms,” but those who are hospitalized may have the disease for much longer.

“We are very familiar with the prolonged hospitalizations from complications from COVID,” she said.

Can you get BA.5 twice?

There's limited data to support whether a person can get BA.5 twice, but health experts say it's unlikely to happen within the first month after infection.

“For the first couple of weeks, if you have a healthy immune system, you’re probably going to be fully resistant to get reinfected,” Dowdy said.

But that protection wanes over time, he said. If a person is exposed to COVID-19, it’s possible to get reinfected with the same variant two to four months after infection.

While possible, it’s unlikely BA.5 will keep circulating over the next few months as the population builds up immunity against the subvariant. It’s more likely that a new variant or subvariant of omicron will emerge as the virus attempts to bypass that immunity and infect as many people as it can.

It’s a “bit of a cat and mouse game between the virus and our immune systems,” Dowdy said. “If we don’t see another subvariant emerge for the next couple of months, then yes, absolutely people will be reinfected with BA.5.”

What to do if you get infected by BA.5?

If you test positive for COVID-19 or start feeling sick with related symptoms, CDC recommendations say stay home for at least five days and isolate from other household members.

The agency also recommends wearing a well-fitted mask around others in the home.

If you're fever-free for 24 hours and symptoms are improving after the five days, the CDC says you can end isolation but continue to take precautions for five additional days. This includes wearing well-fitted masks around others inside and outside the home, and avoiding travel.

How are BA.4 and BA.5 different? What other COVID variants are there?

BA.4 and BA.5 share mutations with other omicron subvariants, like BA.1 and BA.2, but contain additional mutations within the spike protein, according to the National Institute for Communicable disease, a national public health institute in South Africa.

The two subvariants are identical to each other in terms of spike protein mutations, the institute said, but differ in mutations that are outside the spike gene.

BA.5 evades immunity better than BA.4, said Weber. However, it’s not believed to be more transmissible or cause more severe disease.

With the exception of a few random cases here and there, Dowdy said there’s probably no other coronavirus variants in circulation outside of omicron and its sublineages. Delta and the variants that preceded it are likely out of the picture.

“When we’re talking about COVID, we’re talking about omicron now,” he said.
 

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It's winter in Australia. Geert said that we'd be seeing more flu in the winter as a result of vaccines.


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Current Flu Season More Severe Than COVID: Australian State Premier
by Tyler Durden
Wednesday, Jul 20, 2022 - 07:00 PM

Authored by Rebecca Zhu via The Epoch Times,

New South Wales Premier Dominic Perrottet has called for a reduction in the seven-day isolation period adding that the winter influenza virus currently posed a bigger issue than COVID-19.

“In many cases at the moment, the current strand of influenza is more severe than the current strands of COVID,” the premier told 2GB radio.​

He later added that the state was currently experiencing “one of the worst flu seasons we’ve ever had” and urged people to get a flu shot.

Perrottet also advocated for reducing the mandatory isolation period after a person tests positive for COVID-19, noting that health advice states COVID will remain for at least a “couple of years.”

“So in those circumstances, we need to look at isolation requirements in a way that puts downward still maintains downward pressure on our health system,” he said.

The premier said considerations for other competing health issues, educational outcomes, and opportunities to go to work also need to be balanced as the country moves to the next phase of the pandemic.

In response, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said it was “not the time” to for the changing of the COVID-19 isolation period.

“Well, we had that discussion. And the advice that is there from the chief medical officer, Professor [Paul] Kelly, was that now is certainly not the time for that to be reconsidered,” Albanese told FiveAA radio.]​

Returned Pandemic Leave Payments

The comments come after the prime minister capitulated to reinstate pandemic leave payments that originally ended on June 30.

“I want to make sure that people aren’t left behind, that vulnerable people are looked after, and that no one is faced with the unenviable choice of not being able to isolate properly without losing an income and without being put in a situation that is very difficult,” Albanese told reporters on July 16.​

Treasurer Jim Chalmers defended the extension of the program after the federal government previously ruled it out due to budget pressures.

He said the decision was made due to a change in health advice following a new wave of COVID-19 cases.

The payment scheme will be funded in a 50-50 split between state and federal governments.

There are also renewed calls for the return of mask mandates, however, the prime minister previously indicated that it would be up to the discretion of the states.
 

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Faster Spreading Omicron Variants Hit China, Sparking Lockdown Concerns
by Tyler Durden
Tuesday, Jul 19, 2022 - 10:45 PM

Authored by Alex Wu via The Epoch Times,

Two, more infectious, COVID-19 Omicron variants were detected in China, and a new round of outbreaks has quickly spread to more than 20 of China’s 31 provinces in 2 weeks. Two big cities in western China have been locked down, while major Chinese port cities are conducting mass testing. All of this is sparking concerns about more lockdowns and economic repercussions.

Fourteen COVID-19 cases were reported on July 17 in China’s southwestern city Chengdu in Sichuan Province. The patients are infected with Omicron variant BA.2.12.1, which hadn’t been seen in China before.

According to mainland Chinese media China Business Network, as of July 18 as many as 10 subvariants of Omicron have been detected across the country since the first locally confirmed case of BA.5 variant was reported in China’s megacity Xi’an on July 6.

Public research data shows that the Omicron BA.2.12.1 variant strain is more infectious than the original variant of Omicron. Its transmission speed is 1.2 times that of the BA.2 variant. Both BA.2.12.1 and BA.5 can escape vaccine-elicited antibodies.

Faster Spreading Variants Causing Lockdowns of Big Cities

On July 18, authorities ordered a 7-day lockdown of Chengdu, the provincial capital with a population of 16.3 million. During that time, nobody is allowed to leave the city without a negative COVID-19 nucleic acid test result from the last 48 hours.

The official notice also states that indoor entertainment venues such as bars, KTVs, gyms, and various public cultural and sports venues in the city are temporarily shut down. Large-scale conferences are not allowed to be held in the city for the time being, in-person training and religious activities are suspended, no catering services for banquets, and various clinics are prohibited from accepting patients with a fever.

As the more infectious variants BA.5 and BA.2.12.1 are spreading in China, authorities in more big cities have ordered lockdowns, partial lockdowns, or district control.

Many areas in Lanzhou, the capital city of Gansu Province, population 3.8 million, are under lockdown, and nearly 10,000 residents have been sent to centralized isolation facilities for quarantine due to the new outbreak.

Ms. Chen, the owner of a restaurant in Chengguan District of Lanzhou, told The Epoch Times on July 18 that the city was shut down last week. “The epidemic here is very serious. The entire area is locked down. All shops and restaurants have been closed since last week. Everyone is ordered to stay at home and not allowed to go out.”

Ms. Zhang, a resident of Yantan Road of Chengguan District in Lanzhou City also told The Epoch Times on July 18 that the city was already under lockdown.

“Because of the outbreak, the whole city of Lanzhou is shut down. You can’t get in. There are policemen standing on the streets, and you are not allowed to walk on the street. Taxi services are stopped. All the communities [neighborhoods] in the city are closed.”

The Epoch Times called Yanbei Street office in Chengguan District and the Lanzhou CDC but couldn’t get through.

Meanwhile, mass COVID-19 testing is conducted in the mega port cities of Shanghai and Tianjin, sparking fears of another round of city-wide lockdowns that would further worsen the Chinese economy and disrupt the global supply chain.
 

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Japanese Researchers Discover Antibodies From Alpacas Can Combat COVID-19 Variants
By Raven Wu
July 21, 2022

Researchers in Japan have found two types of antibodies derived from alpacas that are effective against all SARS-CoV-2 variants.

The derived antibodies from the South American animal are expected to be put into practical use within the next two years.

The researchers are from Kyoto, and they published their research in the journal Nature on July 6.

Antibodies are proteins used by the immune system that bind to pathogenic viruses and bacteria so that they cannot bind to our cells. Alpacas have significantly smaller antibodies than humans and the researchers believe that their nanobodies (a single-domain antibody) bind to SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, easier than human antibodies.

It was discovered that out of the antibodies of alpacas, six types could easily bind to SARS-CoV-2 and two among them, when fused together, are effective against all SARS-CoV-2 mutant strains apart from the new Omicron BA.5 variant that hasn’t been tested yet. But the team said they are confident that the nanobodies will be effective for this variant as well.

Buffered Solutions

During the research, it was found that the concentration of a buffered solution affects how antibodies bind to the virus. In a hypertonic buffer solution, four clones (P17, P86, C116, and P334) “showed high avidity for the SARS-CoV-2 spike complex,” while the other clones (C17, C49, P158, C246 and P543) showed high avidity in a hypotonic buffer.

The research also found that P86, C246, P158, P543, and P334 could detect both the original and Omicron variant spike proteins, and P17, P86, P158, P334, and P543 “could recognize the Omicron spike on the cell surface” through the use of flow cytometry assays.

Researchers tested the potency of five clones (C17, P17, P86, C116, and C246) for the Alpha, Beta, and Delta variants of the virus. Results showed that “the P17, P86, and C116 clones more potently neutralized the Alpha variant… the P86 and C246 clones significantly suppressed the Beta variant; and P17 and C246 suppressed the Delta variant.”

Also, the research found that C246 cannot neutralize the virus even at the highest concentration tested, but P86 can suppress the authentic Omicron BA.1 variant virus. P17 can neutralize the Delta variant and P86 can neutralize the Beta variant. Scientists said that P86 was the most potent clone because it is “small enough to access the hidden cleft that is not recognized by human antibodies”.

Professor Akifumi Tokaori of Kyoto University told Sankei Shimbun on July 14 that they will begin clinical trials of the antibody cocktail next year and aim to have it ready for practical use within two years.
 

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China’s Omicron Variant Outbreak May Affect Industry in Yangtze River Delta
Global solar energy supply chains may be affected
By Kane Zhang
July 21, 2022

A few weeks after Shanghai’s reopening from its three-month lockdown, another outbreak of Omicron variant BA.5 occurred in Shanghai City, Anhui Province, and other areas. As of July 12, there were 804 areas in mainland China designated as medium or high-risk due to active COVID-19 cases. The Yangtze River Delta industrial area, including 73 high-risk areas, is also affected, with 34 located in Anhui Province and 39 in Jiangsu Province.

As reports of new cases emerged in Shanghai on July 11, some neighborhood committees advised residents to start preparing 14-day stockpile of supplies.

The press conference on epidemic prevention and control in Shanghai announced that from July 12–14, all residents in Huangpu District, Xuhui District, Changning District, Jing’an District, Putuo District, Hongkou District, Yangpu District, Minhang District, Baoshan District, and any other regions with new cases would have to undergo another round of PCR testing for COVID-19.

In Pudong New District, a seven-day lockdown management in certain neighborhoods was enforced two days earlier on July 10, with all residents required to do four screenings within the week-long lockdown period.

Anhui is an important economic hub in the Yangtze River Delta region. From June 26 to July 6, Sixian County in northeastern Anhui Province reported more than 1,000 cases of infection. Starting from July 1, local authorities imposed stay-at-home control over Sixian County and the nearby Lingbi County. When new cases were reported on July 11, the local area continued to adhere to “non-essential, non-moving” isolation and control. Official have not said when the lockdown will be lifted.

There are also outbreaks in many areas of Jiangsu Province. On July 11, new local cases emerged in Wuxi City, Suzhou City, and Lianyungang City. Ganyu District of Lianyungang City imposed a snap lockdown on the morning of July 11, and residents had to queue up for PCR tests in the rain.

Zhejiang Province reported new local positive cases on July 11. At 7 p.m. that night, Xiaoshan District, Hangzhou City released news of a local epidemic, and some citizens of Xiaoshan District saw their health codes turn yellow. Local authorities required these citizens to perform three PCR tests for three consecutive days from the day their health code turned yellow.

Economic Impact

The GDP of Jiangsu Province ranks second in China, and it is also the main production center of solar energy products in the world. China’s solar cell industry enterprises are mainly located in the eastern coastal areas of the Yangtze River Delta, with most concentrated in Jiangsu Province in eight solar industrial parks. As the epidemic continues to spread again, global solar energy product supplies may be affected.

Yiwu town in Zhejiang Province is the world’s largest wholesale market for small commodities. Also affected by the epidemic, Yiwu Airport announced on July 3 that it was temporarily canceling all flights to Beijing. The Epoch Times noticed that the flights have not resumed as of press time.

Xiao Di (pseudonym) from Ningbo City of Zhejiang Province told The Epoch Times, “The authorities treat the epidemic as very high priority. Even if there are only a few infected people, all residents throughout the city have to take the nucleic acid test. If residents need to go to hospitals, banks, and other public areas, they must provide nucleic acid test result taken within 48 hours. The key is that lockdown measures have too much impact on the operation of enterprises. For example, Beilun Port in Ningbo is the fourth largest port in the world, so many employees were taken away for quarantine during the last epidemic, causing supply chain disruptions and port congestion. If all employees stop working, how could you avoid port congestion?”

Hu Jun (pseudonym) from Xiaoshan District of Hangzhou City told The Epoch Times that even if work and production resumes soon, the epidemic has had a huge impact on small and medium-sized enterprises.

“Many companies have gone bankrupt, some business owners have gone to find another job, and many people have lost their jobs. E-commerce and logistics companies have strict nucleic acid requirements, and those who have tested positive or have been in the quarantine cabin won’t be considered when they apply for a job position in these industries.

“Moreover, migrant workers who come to Hangzhou from Shanghai are all told to go back to Shanghai; they are generally not accepted in other areas,” he said, citing the tendency to now consider people from Shanghai as potential virus carriers due to the strict lockdowns in the city earlier this year.

“When Xiaoshan District was placed under lockdown a few days ago, the news outlets kept silent; but when the lockdown was lifted, it was opened with great fanfare,” Hu said.
 

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Pfizer-BioNTech and AstraZeneca vaccines offer high protection against severe COVID-19, 6 months after second doses
by University of Bristol
July 21, 2022

Protection against severe COVID-19 by two doses of Pfizer-BioNTech and AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccines remained high up to six months after second doses, finds new research which analysed NHS health record data on over seven million adults. Reassuringly, the University of Bristol-led study published in The BMJ today, found protection in older adults aged over 65 years, and in clinically vulnerable adults.

Researchers from Bristol Medical School sought to investigate how quickly vaccine effectiveness waned over time in adults without prior SARS-CoV-2 infection and who received two doses of BNT162b2 (Pfizer-BioNTech) or ChAdOx1 (AstraZeneca) COVID-19 vaccine compared with unvaccinated individuals.

Using linked GP, hospital, and COVID-19 records on 1,951,866 and 3,219,349 adults who had received two doses of BNT162b2 and ChAdOx1, respectively and 2,422,980 unvaccinated adults, researchers were able to provide a clearer picture of vaccine effectiveness against COVID-19 hospital admission, COVID-19 death, and positiveSARS-CoV-2 test.

Rates of COVID-19 hospital admission and COVID-19 death were substantially lower among vaccinated than unvaccinated adults up to six months after their second dose. Vaccine effectiveness against these events was found to be at least 80 per cent for BNT162b2, and at least 75 per cent for ChAdOx1. However, waning vaccine effectiveness against infection with SARS-CoV-2 meant that rates in vaccinated individuals were similar to or higher than in unvaccinated individuals by six months after the second dose.

Dr. Elsie Horne, Senior Research Associate in Medical Statistics and Health Data Science in Bristol Medical School: Population Health Sciences (PHS) and the study's lead author, said: "Until now there has been limited and conflicting evidence relating to the rate of waning following second dose of COVID-19 vaccines, whether it extends to severeCOVID-19, and whether the rate differs according to age and clinical vulnerability.

"Although we found that protection against severe COVID-19 provided by two doses of vaccine wanes over time, the very high initial protection means that, despite waning, protection remains high six months after the second dose. This finding was consistent across all adults, including older adults and those who are at risk of severe COVID-19."

Jonathan Sterne, Professor of Medical Statistics and Epidemiology in Bristol Medical School: PHS, Director of the National Institute for Health and Care Research Bristol Biomedical Research Centre (NIHR Bristol BRC), Director of Health Data Research UK (HDR UK) South-West and co-author, added: "We found that the rate at which vaccine effectiveness waned was consistent across subgroups defined by age and clinical vulnerability. Studying how long COVID-19 vaccines remain effective continues to be important to scheduling and targeting of booster vaccinations."

The researchers now plan to lead a follow-up study looking at vaccine effectiveness to one year post-second dose and into the era of the Omicron variant. They are also investigating the rate of waning in vulnerable clinical subgroups, such as those with chronic kidney disease and with cancer.

The study was supported by two COVID-19 National Core Studies (NCS) programmes: COVID-19 Longitudinal Health and Wellbeing and COVID-19 Data and Connectivity; Asthma UK; NIHR (National Institute for Health and Care Research) and Wellcome. TPP provided technical expertise and infrastructure pro bono in the context of a national emergency.
 

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Post-COVID lung disease shares origins with other scarring lung disorders
by University of California - San Diego
July 20, 2022


While most people recover from COVID-19 within a week or two, up to one-third of survivors experience persistent or new symptoms weeks and months after initial infection.

One form of "long COVID" is interstitial lung disease (ILD), a group of chronic pulmonary disorders characterized by inflammation and scarring (fibrosis) that make it hard for the lungs to get enough oxygen. Little is currently known about ILD, from diagnosis to prognosis to management. In its most severe form, the disease is fatal without a lung transplant.

In a new study, published in the July 20, 2022 online issue of eBioMedicine, researchers at University of California San Diego provide the first insights into the fundamental cellular pathologies that drive ILD.

"Using an artificial intelligence (AI) approach, we found that lung fibrosis caused by COVID-19 resembles idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF), the most common and the deadliest form of ILD," said co-senior study author Pradipta Ghosh, MD, professor in the departments of Medicine and Cellular and Molecular Medicine at UC San Diego School of Medicine. "At a fundamental level, both conditions display similar gene expression patterns in the lungs and blood, and dysfunctional processes within alveolar type II (AT2) cells."

AT2 cells play several critical roles in pulmonary function, including the production of lung surfactant that keeps lung cells from collapsing after exhalation and regeneration of lung cells after injury.

"The findings are insightful because AT2 cells are known to contain an elegant quality control network that responds to stress, internal or external," said Ghosh. "Failure of quality control leads to broader organ dysfunction and, in this case, fibrotic remodeling of the lung."

To conduct their study, Ghosh collaborated with co-senior author Debashis Sahoo, Ph.D., associate professor in the departments of Computer Science, Engineering and Pediatrics at UC San Diego to access transdisciplinary approaches, such as AI-assisted "big data" analysis.

Ghosh and Sahoo said the approach would help them stay unbiased in navigating the unknowns of an emerging, post-pandemic disease. They analyzed more than 1,000 human lung transcriptomic datasets associated with various lung conditions, specifically looking for gene expression patterns, inflammation signaling and cellular changes. The disease with the closest match: IPF.

The authors were able to successfully induce these tell-tale elements in human lung organoids, in a hamster model of COVID-19, and could confirm their presence in the lungs of deceased individuals with COVID-19. Key elements were also reversed in the hamsters using anti-SARS-COV-2 therapeutics. A deeper analysis pinpointed endoplasmic reticulum stress as the shared early trigger of both post-COVID lung disease and ILD.

Ghosh said the use of computational models to identify shared gene expression and cellular processes between COVID-19 and IPF suggests utility of our findings beyond the current pandemic.

"The insights, biomarkers, tools, mechanisms and promising therapeutic avenues identified here are likely to spur the development of therapies for patients with IPF and other fibrotic interstitial lung diseases, all of whom have limited or no treatment options."

IPF affects approximately 100,000 persons in the United States, with 30,000 to 40,000 new cases annually. The condition has a poor prognosis, with an estimated mean survival of 2 to 5 years from time of diagnosis.
 

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COVID vaccines averted infection in 10% of patient-facing healthcare staff during second wave
by British Medical Journal
July 20, 2022

The rapid COVID-19 vaccine rollout from December 2020 averted infection in a large proportion of NHS hospital workers in England during the second wave of the pandemic, suggests research published by The BMJ today.

Without the vaccine rollout, which prioritized frontline healthcare workers, an extra 10% of all patient facing hospital workers would have been infected—and staff absence due to COVID-19 could have been 69% higher.

What's more, the odds of infection increased by 2% every day a healthcare worker went without vaccination.

Another study published by The BMJ today compared the effectiveness of the Pfizer-BioNTech and the Oxford-AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccines against infection in 317,341 health and social care workers in England vaccinated between 4 January and 28 February 2021.


Using data from the OpenSAFELY research platform, the results show strong protection from both vaccines and no substantial differences between the two vaccines in rates of infection or COVID-19 related hospital attendance and admission.

Together, these findings provide essential insights into SARS-CoV-2 infection in health and social care workers that can be used to guide further infection prevention and control measures.

Healthcare workers were among the first groups eligible for COVID-19 vaccination from December 2020. During rollout, coverage varied between healthcare worker groups, potentially leading to disparities in exposure and protection across the workforce.

Researchers therefore wanted to examine the rate of, risk factors for, and impact of vaccines on SARS-CoV-2 infection during England's second wave (1 September 2020 to 30 April 2021) in susceptible hospital healthcare workers.

Using a combination of statistical and mathematical modeling, they analyzed data from 18,284 clinical, support, and administrative staff with no evidence of previous infection who were recruited from 105 NHS hospital trusts in England as part of the SARS-CoV-2 Immunity and Reinfection Evaluation (SIREN) Study.

At enrollment, participants completed a survey about their demographic, household and occupational characteristics, and subsequently completed fortnightly questionnaires that included whether they had been vaccinated. They also had PCR tests every fortnight and antibody tests every month throughout the study period (1 September 2020 to 30 April 2021).

After taking account of demographic, household, and occupational factors, 2,353 (13%) of participants became infected during the second wave.

Infections peaked in late December 2020 and decreased from January 2021, in line with rapid vaccination coverage among healthcare workers and a national lockdown.

Factors increasing the likelihood of infection in the second wave were being under 25 years old, living in a household of five or more people, having frequent exposure to patients with COVID-19, working in an emergency department or inpatient ward setting, and being a healthcare assistant.

Time to first vaccination emerged as being strongly associated with infection, with each additional day multiplying a participant's odds of infection by 2%.

Mathematical model simulations indicated that an additional 10% of all patient-facing hospital healthcare workers would have been infected were it not for the rapid vaccination coverage.

This is an observational study, so can't establish cause, and limitations include the lack of detail needed to explore variations in hospital infection prevention and control policies, and differences in individuals' behavior that may have affected the results.

However, SIREN is a large study that is well positioned to explore the incidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection in the hospital workforce.

As such, the researchers say this study "reinforces the importance of vaccination among healthcare workers during a significant wave of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic in England."

They add that "greater understanding of transmission dynamics among healthcare workers, particularly according to role and setting, will support NHS trusts in protecting their workforce and patients from SARS-CoV-2 infection and potentially other seasonal winter viruses."

These findings remind us that some categories of staff remain at higher risk of occupational COVID-19 (and presumably other respiratory infections), despite using personal protective equipment as advised at the time, writes an expert in a linked editorial.

This raises the question of whether vaccines and immunity are a good enough defense, or whether more stringent measures such as better personal protective equipment and ventilation are still required in high risk healthcare settings.

The NHS now faces a dilemma. "It is unclear what living with COVID-19 means in a healthcare setting, and whether we should now tolerate spread of a much milder infection in our hospitals. Further surveillance and research will help inform this debate, but ethical and political considerations are also likely to play a part."
 

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Anti-inflammatory compound shows potential in treating patients with severe COVID-19
by University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston
July 20, 2022

1658390679607.jpeg
Pharmacokinetics of OP-101. OP-101 concentrations were measured in patient serum collected at 2, 12, and 24 hours after intravenous administration of one dose of OP-101 at 2, 4, or 8 mg/kg. Mean and standard deviation at each time point is shown for all the doses. A dose-proportional pharmacokinetic profile was obtained for OP-101. OP-101 was cleared rapidly with most of the drug being eliminated by about 24 hours after infusion. Credit: Science Translational Medicine (2022). DOI: 10.1126/scitranslmed.abo2652

An anti-inflammatory compound may have the potential to treat systemic inflammation and brain injury in patients with severe COVID-19 and significantly reduce their chances of death, according to a new study from UTHealth Houston and other institutions.

A team of researchers including UTHealth Houston faculty members Aaron M. Gusdon, MD, assistant professor in the Vivian L. Smith Department of Neurosurgery with McGovern Medical School at UTHealth Houston; H. Alex Choi, MD, associate professor in the department as well as the Department of Neurology; and Louise D. McCullough, MD, Ph.D., professor and Roy M. and Phyllis Gough Huffington Distinguished Chair in the Department of Neurology, conducted a multi-site, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, adaptive Phase 2 trial evaluating the safety and efficacy of an anti-inflammatory compound, called OP-101, in patients with severe COVID-19. The results of the trial were published today in Science Translational Medicine.

In the trial, 24 patients classified as having severe COVID-19 across five clinical sites in the U.S. were randomized to receive a single intravenous dose of placebo or OP-101 at 2, 4, or 8 mg/kg. All patients received standard of care, including corticosteroids.

"OP-101 is a novel nanotherapeutic compound that specifically targets activated macrophages and microglia, the primary immune cell in the brain," said Gusdon, who was first author on the study. "Due to its excellent safety profile, we were excited to offer this therapy to these critically ill patients at Memorial Hermann Hospital."

Hyperinflammation triggered by SARS-CoV-2 is a major cause of disease severity in COVID-19. OP-101 was found to be better than a placebo at decreasing inflammatory markers, as well as better at reducing markers of neurological injury, including neurofilament light chain and glial fibrillary acidic protein.

Additionally, risk for the composite outcome of mechanical ventilation or death at 30 or 60 days after treatment was 71% for patients receiving the placebo, but just 18% for patients in the pooled OP-101 treatment arms. At 60 days after treatment, 3 of 7 patients given placebo and 14 of 17 patients treated with OP-101 survived.

The data shows that OP-101 was well tolerated in the critically ill patient population and could serve as an effective treatment for patients hospitalized with COVID-19.

"Although this was a small-dose escalation trial, there was clearly a strong signal toward benefit at both acute and chronic timepoint," Gusdon said. "The possibility that this therapy could also benefit patients with other diseases that lead to systemic inflammatory responses, including various forms of brain injury, is extremely exciting."

OP-101 is a nanotherapeutic compound that has previously been evaluated in several animal models of inflammatory disease and has shown superior anti-inflammatory and anti-oxidant effects.

The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in more than 300 million people infected globally, with more than 5 million deaths.
 

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A study links long COVID-related fatigue to anxiety and depression for the first time
by Beatriz de Vera, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC)
July 20, 2022

The most common symptoms of the post-COVID-19 condition known as long COVID include fatigue, shortness of breath and cognitive dysfunction, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). To be considered symptoms of long COVID, they must be present for at least two months during the three months after the onset of the disease.
A recent study in Brain and Behavior showed that the disease had a generalized impact on attention skills, executive functions, learning and long-term memory. Furthermore, the scientific literature estimates that between 9% and 49% of patients present fatigue four weeks after the onset of symptoms, and it may even persist for a year in at least a third of patients.

Nevertheless, a possible link between fatigue and anxiety or depression in patients with long COVID had not been studied in laboratories. Now, a study by the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC), which has been published in open access format in the Journal of Neurology, has now shown that fatigue in long COVID patients is related to anxiety, depression and apathy.

"Persistent fatigue is very disabling and greatly limits people's quality of life. If someone suffers from fatigue as a result of COVID-19, it's important to study this situation in further depth, and to determine what other symptoms or disorders are associated with this condition," said Marco Calabria, lead researcher of the article, a member of the Cognitive NeuroLab group at the UOC and a member of the Faculty of Health Sciences.

According to the author, now that we know the link between fatigue and depression, "clinicians should explore these aspects to provide a focus for therapeutic guidelines." However, something that this research has not clarified is the direction of the effect: "it's unclear whether fatigue leads to depression, or vice versa," he explained.

Scientists studied a sample of 136 patients with COVID-19 who were suffering from cognitive deficits eight months after contracting the virus. "We found that fatigue is linked to sustained attention, which we use to perform a task for a long period of time and which keeps us focused, and to executive functions, which enable us to temporarily store information in order to perform tasks such as calculating, or reproducing a phrase that we've heard," said Calabria.

Studying fatigue: a clinical challenge

Fatigue is characterized by excessive tiredness and physical and/or cognitive and muscular weakness. It has been associated with medical conditions such as post-viral infection and neurological diseases. Nevertheless, although it could be broadly outlined in these terms, there is no universally accepted definition of this clinical condition, and knowledge of its underlying pathogenic mechanism is limited, which is why it represents a clinical challenge for experts.

Another challenge for the scientists was to separate post-COVID-19 fatigue from the consequences of the specific situation experienced during the pandemic. "Fatigue is a symptom related to viral infections, and this suggested that it'd be one of the possible symptoms of SARS-CoV-2 infection," said Calabria, who believes that it is possible that, in the first waves of the pandemic, isolation may have contributed to the increase in some symptoms. "But some observations tell us that this isn't always the case: fatigue prevents many people from going back to their previous lifestyle, while others continue to suffer from fatigue despite being able to return to pre-pandemic conditions and we found that the prevalence of apathy associated with COVID-19 increased from 17% before infection to 62% after infection."

According to its authors, the results of the study highlight the importance of a holistic approach when evaluating and considering a potential treatment for COVID-19 patients experiencing fatigue. However, there are still many unanswered questions: "how these changes are reflected at the brain level, how long they last, who's more likely to suffer from these symptoms for a long time, and what the individual characteristics that predict recovery are. We'll answer all these questions in the long term, because this area's something new and unknown," concluded the researcher.
 

Heliobas Disciple

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Higher rates of preterm birth in women infected with COVID-19 in late pregnancy
by Public Library of Science
July 20, 2022

There is limited data on pregnancy and COVID-19 infection. To date, studies have been small, generally limited to patients who are hospitalized, and have often not reported outcomes depending on infection during different stages of pregnancy. Noga Fallach and colleagues from the Kahn-Sagol-Maccabi Research and Innovation Center used anonymized data captured by Maccabi Healthcare Services in Israel to match 2,753 women who were infected during pregnancy with 2,753 women without reported COVID-19 infections. Their study ran from February 21, 2020 until July 2, 2021. Of the infected women, 17.4% got COVID-19 during the first trimester, 34.2% during the second and 48.4% during the third trimester.

COVID-19 infection in the first and second trimesters was not associated with increased risk of preterm birth. However, women infected in their third trimester were 2.76 times more likely to experience preterm birth (2.76, 95% CI 1.63–4.67)—while women infected after 34 weeks of gestation were over seven times more likely to experience preterm birth (7.10, 95% CI 2.44–20.61). There was a lower rate of waters breaking before labor began in infected women (39.1%) vs non-infected women (58.3%), and proportions of caesarean sections and baby loss were similar in both groups.

Because of the increased risk of preterm birth in women infected during late pregnancy, the researchers suggest that during their third trimester, and particularly after 34 weeks of gestation, women should be advised to distance and wear masks to reduce risk of infection.

Dr. Tal Patalon, head of Kahn-Sagol-Maccabi (KSM), the research and innovation center of Maccabi Healthcare Services in Israel adds: "The results are encouraging and reassuring that COVID-19 infection during pregnancy is not associated with any type of pregnancy loss. However, it should be remembered that the research group tested the COVID pre-Delta variants, and does not refer to the dominant variant today, which is Omicron. We continue to conduct research to provide real-world data and knowledge to the public and decision-makers."
 

Heliobas Disciple

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New fast test discriminates between cellular immunity to SARS-CoV-2 after vaccination or infection
by Johannes Angerer, Medical University of Vienna
July 20, 2022


1658390908097.jpeg
Results of cellular proliferation assays performed with gradient-isolated peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) stimulated with the indicated antigen-specific and polyclonal stimuli in classical plate assays for 7 days. Shown is the summary of stimulation indices (SI, y-axis) of PBMC which were incubated with the indicated stimuli (x-axis). The bars represent the median, whiskers the Hodges-Lehmann 95% confidence intervals, dark blue circles show proliferation of PBMC of COVID-19 convalescent patients, red circles those of non-exposed healthy controls and light blue squares those of vaccinees. M-mix, SARS-CoV-2 matrix protein peptide mix; N-mix, SARS-CoV-2 nucleocapsid protein peptide mix; PHA, phytohemagglutinin; S-mix, SARS-CoV-2 spike protein peptide mix; SEB, Staphylococcal enterotoxin B; TBE, tick borne encephalitis antigen; TT, tetanus toxoid. Data show the summary of 35 COVID-19 convalescent patients, except 31 for SEB, 36 healthy controls, except 32 for SEB, and 40 vaccinees. p values were calculated by Tuckey's test. Only significant differences are shown. ***p < .001. Credit: Allergy (2022). DOI: 10.1111/all.15406

A MedUni Vienna research team has developed a new blood test that indicates a person's status of cellular immunity to SARS-CoV-2 within just 48 hours. This test is particularly relevant for vulnerable patient groups, whose own antibody response is not meaningful. The test can even indicate whether immunity is the result of vaccination against SARS-CoV-2 or of survived infection. The study data were recently published in Allergy.

The new test, developed by Bernhard Kratzer in a study conducted at MedUni Vienna's Center for Pathophysiology, Infectiology and Immunology under the leadership of Winfried Pickl and Rudolf Valenta, is based on the memory response of T cells to three different SARS-CoV-2 peptide mixtures. T cells are an important part of the specific cellular immune defense: they eliminate cells infected with SARS-CoV-2 and support antibody production by B cells. "Currently, it takes at least a week to perform and evaluate such T-cell tests, and the tests can only be performed in specialized laboratories. In contrast, our newly developed test is performed directly with a whole blood sample and can be evaluated after only 48 hours," explains study leader Winfried Pickl.

From September, the new test will be available at the Institute of Immunology at MedUni Vienna's Center for Pathophysiology, Infectiology and Immunology and is particularly useful for those who are unable to produce antibodies against SARS-CoV-2.

Discriminating between vaccinated and recovered

Analyses of blood samples from COVID-19-recovered patients, based on peptide mixtures of S-, M- and NC-proteins, enabled the research team to not only detect the two antiviral cytokines interleukin (IL)-2 and interferon-gamma in large quantities but also to identify the cytokine IL-13 as a marker for the highly specific T-cell immune response against SARS-CoV-2. IL-13 was previously known as a marker for allergic immune responses, but it apparently also plays a key role in establishing a long-lasting antibody response.

By using the three different peptide mixtures, it is also possible to discriminate between those who have been vaccinated against SARS-CoV-2 and those who have had COVID-19. Samples from recovered volunteers responded with significant cytokine production to all three peptide mixtures, whereas samples from vaccinated volunteers only responded to the specific peptide mixture in which the protein was induced by vaccination (S protein), and to which the vaccinated subjects then went on to build up cellular immunity. The novel test therefore allows a specific cellular immune response to SARS-CoV-2 to be identified even in individuals who, for various reasons, are unable to develop meaningful antibody responses.

T-cell immunity post infection is detectable longer than antibody responses

In the study, the T-cell response was also analyzed ten months after infection. It was found that the T-cell response was still as strong as that measured ten weeks after an infection. This is remarkable in that antibody levels in the blood have already dropped significantly ten months after infection. This long-lasting T-cell response may protect against severe disease in the event of re-infection with SARS-CoV-2.

The results of this study make a significant contribution to our understanding of the immune response to SARS-CoV-2 and will enable us to quickly establish whether specific individuals have built up cellular immunity to SARS-CoV-2.
 

Heliobas Disciple

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What You Don’t Know Could Hurt You: Novavax’s ‘Loud-and-Clear’ Nanoparticle Adjuvant
Advisors to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Tuesday unanimously recommended Novavax’s COVID-19 vaccine, claiming the unvaxxed are the product’s “primary target population."
By Children's Health Defense Team
07/20/2022

In recent months, COVID-19 vaccination in the U.S. has “slowed to a crawl” as an increasingly distrustful public says “no thanks” to primary shots and boosters.

Still, U.S. public health agencies continue to authorize, approve and recommend COVID-19 vaccines — even for infants.

On Tuesday, advisors to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) — perhaps believing they can reverse the slowdown in “vaccine uptake” and without admitting to the ravages caused by the Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson (J&J) shots — unanimously recommended the “Novavax COVID-19 Vaccine, Adjuvanted.”

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) last week granted Novavax Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) for its COVID-19 vaccine, for adults age 18 and up.

Back in 2020, Operation Warp Speed awarded Novavax — another company that like Moderna, never brought a product to market before COVID-19 — a secret contract worth $1.6 billion (now being reported as $1.8 billion).

It was one of the largest taxpayer handouts channeled through Operation Warp Speed.

The media’s obliging sales pitch is that the Novavax injection is a “game changer” in comparison to the mRNA and adenovirus-vectored gene therapy shots, and should be “reassuring to those who are hesitant.”

In fact, according to the CDC’s advisors, the unvaccinated represent the “primary target population for Novavax.”

To further entice the unvaccinated, headlines feature the misleading claim that Novavax’s EUA jab — featuring recombinant moth-cell-based nanoparticle technology, the problematic surfactant polysorbate 80 and a never-before-approved nanoparticulate adjuvant called Matrix-M — is “free of side effects.”

However, the day after the FDA issued its Novavax authorization, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) made its own announcement, stating it was updating its product information for the Novavax COVID-19 shot to disclose “new” side effects.

The EMA’s list of side effects included “severe allergic reaction [anaphylaxis] and unusual or decreased feeling in the skin” (called paresthesia and hypoesthesia, respectively).

In addition, the EMA said it is assessing myocarditis and pericarditis as Novavax side effects — safety signals that also were on display in the FDA’s briefing document.

And in clinical trials, older adults who received the Novavax vaccine experienced an increased incidence of hypertension compared to those in the placebo group.

In short, as reported last week and last month by The Defender, the evidence contradicts Novavax’s downplaying of its vaccine’s association with heart problems and other side effects.

Apparently unaware of any potential cardiac risks, die-hards who have swallowed the slanted Novavax messaging blithely suggested in online comments that they would take bizarre skin problems over the heart problems they associate with other COVID-19 vaccines any day.

Adjuvants — ‘leave them out if you can’

Adjuvants, sometimes referred to as “the immunologist’s dirty little secret,” are components of at least 80% of all vaccines. They are supposed to “stimulate and enhance the magnitude and durability of the immune response.”

Additional adjuvant actions include modifying or broadening the immune response in certain age groups (such as infants and older adults) who tend not to respond to vaccines as strongly as vaccine makers would like, and increasing the body’s uptake of the vaccine antigen and protecting the antigen “from degradation and elimination.”

Less often admitted is the sordid association between adjuvants’ tenacious and “immunostimulatory” properties and systemic adverse events — such as neurotoxicity, “enigmatic” autoimmune issues (dubbed “autoimmune/inflammatory syndrome induced by adjuvants” or “ASIA” by Israeli autoimmunity expert Yehuda Shoenfeld), narcolepsy, infertility and other wild-card effects.

For these reasons, Dr. Martin Friede — lead scientist at the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Initiative for Vaccine Research — candidly remarked to other global vaccine insiders in late 2019, “We do not add adjuvants to vaccines because we want to do so” but out of perceived necessity.

Friede added:

“The first lesson is, while you’re making your vaccine, if you can avoid using an adjuvant, please do so. Lesson two is, if you’re going to use an adjuvant, use one that has a history of safety. And lesson three is, if you’re not going to do that, think very carefully.”

Undermining these seeming appeals to safety, Friede has since gone on to shill for Pfizer’s COVID-19 shot and for mRNA vaccine technology more broadly.

Nanoparticles times two

For many decades, aluminum-based adjuvants were the only game in town.

However, with the burgeoning of nanotechnology and encouragement from sponsors like the National Institutes of Health, manufacturers shifted gears toward a new generation of “novel” nanotech adjuvants designed to not only amplify vaccine responses but also to serve as carrier systems that distribute the vaccine’s payload to “key cells of the immune system.”

Generally left unmentioned in the hype surrounding these next-generation, nanoparticle-based adjuvants is the abundant evidence of nanoparticle toxicity.

Well before COVID-19 vaccines came along, researchers warned about nanomaterials’ ability to “cross biological membranes and access cells, tissues and organs” — such as the brain, heart, liver, kidneys, spleen, bone marrow and nervous system — “that larger-sized particles normally cannot.”

They also cautioned that in the cells, “nanomaterials may be taken up by cell mitochondria and the cell nucleus,” with the potential for DNA mutation, structural damage to mitochondria and cell death.

Moreover, researchers identified extensive biotoxic impacts of nanoparticles on the cardiovascular system, including “cardiac damage and dysfunction, vascular dysfunction, EC [epithelial cell] abnormities [sic], atherosclerosis, abnormal angiogenesis, platelet activation, blood coagulation and thrombosis.”

Nevertheless, in pre-COVID-19 studies of experimental vaccines containing Novavax’s Matrix-M, researchers waxed enthusiastic about the nanoparticle-based adjuvant’s “significant” and “potent” action — including its strong “immunostimulatory properties” even without any accompanying antigen.

And, where nanoparticles are concerned, the Novavax COVID-19 shot actually delivers a double whammy, combining Matrix-M with genetically engineered spike protein nanoparticles.

As Novavax explains it (for some reason putting the word “adjuvant” in quotes), “The spike protein is the ‘signal,’ but … we want your immune system to hear that signal loud and clear [and] that signal boost comes from our Matrix-M ‘adjuvant.’”

Phospholipids and autoimmunity

Not unlike the lipid nanoparticle “carrier systems” in the Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 injections, the “immunostimulant” Matrix-M adjuvant includes two types of fat molecules — cholesterol and phospholipids — bundled with detergent-like saponins.

In human biology, phospholipids are essential for properly functioning cell membranes. But in the vaccine laboratory, synthetic versions are viewed as “essential components of advanced vaccines.”

Unheeded by the pharmaceutical industry is the fact that up to 5% of healthy individuals are estimated to harbor antiphospholipid antibodies, produced in a “mistaken” autoimmune response.

Researchers have linked the autoantibodies to the risk of antiphospholipid syndrome (APS), an autoimmune disorder characterized by recurring blood clots as well as fetal loss, fetal growth retardation and other obstetric complications.

Although researchers claim to be baffled as to why some people develop APS, studies have noted the emergence of APS and other autoimmune conditions following receipt of numerous vaccines, including those against tetanus, influenza, human papillomavirus (HPV) — and now COVID-19.

In a study published in August 2021, the authors suggested that in people with preexisting antiphospholipid antibodies, both the mRNA and adenovirus-vectored COVID jabs — and presumably other types such as the Novavax injection — could plausibly function as “the straw that breaks the camel’s back,” triggering “aberrant activation of the coagulation pathway.”

Rheumatologists are also reporting surges in blood clotting disorders, including APS.

Will the unvaccinated public take the bait?

In 2005, the EMA mused that while new adjuvants often had trouble gaining approval due to safety concerns such as “acute toxicity and the possibility of delayed side effects … an increased level of toxicity may be acceptable if the benefit of the vaccine is substantial.”

In a 2017 study, investigators studying Matrix-M approvingly noted that “rapid activation” of the immune system “is highly desirable in adjuvants used for emergency vaccination.”

With its authorization of Novavax’s souped-up COVID-19 jab, the FDA appears to have endorsed both of these views.

Outside the U.S., Novavax’s potent adjuvant also is being test-driven in children in the African nation of Burkina Faso, where almost 1 in 10 of the unfortunate toddlers who received an experimental Matrix-M-containing malaria vaccine withdrew or were “lost to follow-up” before or just after the third dose.

Acknowledging only seven serious adverse events, the researchers concluded, “None … were attributed to the vaccine.”

Does Novavax even take its product seriously?

In a comment posted at Yahoo!Finance, a person who signed up for the Novavax clinical trials and then, after researching the untried company, decided to withdraw, noted the doctor running the trial responded, “Oh sure, that’s fine. You want to wait and get one of the real vaccines.”

In another sign of Novavax’s lackadaisical corporate attitude, the labels on the COVID-19 vaccine vials will contain no information about expiration dates, forcing healthcare providers into using an “online expiry date checker tool,” which CDC advisors acknowledge could be both burdensome and a source of “confusion.”

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines a “nova” as “a star that suddenly increases its light output tremendously and then fades away to its former obscurity in a few months or years.”

Will we say the same for “Nova”-vax’s shot in a few months’ or years’ time?
 

Heliobas Disciple

TB Fanatic
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Why BA.5 Is the King of Coronavirus Variants
Analysis by Dr. Joseph Mercola
July 21, 2022

Story at-a-glance
  • Rapid mutation of the SARS-CoV-2 virus was expected and predicted, as vaccinating against any highly mutable virus, such as the coronavirus, pressures the virus to adapt. Omicron initially arose in “fully vaccinated” patients, raising suspicions that the mass vaccination campaign itself was driving the rapid mutation of the virus
  • One of the latest variants, BA.5 — now believed to be the cause of nearly all COVID infections — is tied with (and may even surpass) measles in terms of its infectiousness and transmissibility. That makes it the most infectious of all SARS-CoV-2 variants, and one of the most infectious viruses known to man
  • Fortunately, it’s also considerably less deadly than the original Wuhan strain
  • Even if you’ve had COVID before, got the jab and all your boosters, and even if you have hybrid immunity (meaning you’ve had both past infection and the COVID jab), chances are you’ll probably catch BA.5, as it seems particularly adept at circumventing all previous defenses
  • The likelihood of reinfection is the fodder fearmongerers needed to reignite calls for COVID restrictions such as lockdowns and stripping people of their inherent rights and freedoms, and, of course, more boosters

As suspected, SARS-CoV-2 continues to mutate. This was entirely expected and predicted, as vaccinating against any highly mutable virus, such as the coronavirus, pressures the virus to adapt.

One of the latest variants, BA.5 — now believed to be the cause of nearly all COVID infections — is tied with measles in terms of its infectiousness and transmissibility.1 That makes it the most infectious of all SARS-CoV-2 variants,2 and one of the most infectious viruses known to man. Fortunately, it's also considerably less deadly than the original Wuhan strain. According to a July 5, 2022, Deadline report:3

"BA.5 was first identified in South Africa on February 26. Less than a month ago, on June 4, it only accounted for 9.6% of cases in the U.S., while predecessor BA.2.12.1 sat atop the heap at 62%.
Today, the CDC [U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] estimates the subvarient is responsible for about 54% of new cases here. That's double BA.2.12.1, which now accounts for 27% of infections. BA.5's rise also leaves sister subvariant BA.4 in the dust at 16%. It's a faster ascension than that of any other variant over the course of the pandemic ...
One reason BA.5 is so dominant is that it seems to be more transmissible than even BA.2.12.1 ... 'The Omicron sub-variant BA.5 is the worst version of the virus that we've seen,' said Eric Topal, who is Founder and Director of the Scripps Research Translational Institute, Professor of Molecular Medicine and Executive Vice-President of Scripps Research, in a substack post4 last week.
'It takes immune escape, already extensive, to the next level, and, as a function of that, enhanced transmissibility, well beyond Omicron (BA.1) and other Omicron family variants that we've seen.'
In other words, BA.5 is much better at evading the immunity provided by vaccines and especially good at dodging the immunity conferred by previous infection.5"

BA.5 Circumvents Previous Defenses

Even if you've had COVID before, got the jab and all your boosters, and even if you have hybrid immunity (meaning you've had both past infection and the COVID jab), chances are you'll probably catch BA.5, as it seems particularly adept at circumventing all previous defenses.

This immune-evading ability is likely an outgrowth of mass injection, as vaccinating a population during an acute outbreak pressures the virus to mutate more rapidly. The image below, from Topol's Substack article,6 illustrates the genetic distance between BA.5 and previous strains.

Genetic Distance of SARS-CoV-2 Variants


This scenario was predicted even before the mass injection campaign began, but no one in a position to make decisions paid any attention to reason. So, here we are.

What remains to be seen is whether BA.5 will cause worse or milder infection than Omicron, which was on par with the common cold. The problem we have is that governments around the world have done a spectacularly good job of undermining good data collection and reporting, so it's extremely difficult at this point to tease out what's really going on in the real world.

For example, in the U.S., COVID cases are at an "all-time low," Dr. Michael Mina, an epidemiologist and chief science officer at telehealth company eMed told CNN, July 11, 2022.7 However, that same day, NPR reported8 that BA.5 was "driving up cases and reinfections" in the U.S. So, which is it?

Europe, meanwhile, is reporting a sharp rise in both cases and hospitalizations.9 Keep in mind that "cases" simply refer to positive PCR tests, which are unreliable at best, as they cannot identify active infections, and COVID hospitalizations are frequently patients who are hospitalized for other conditions and just happen to test positive for COVID.

The only experimental study10 we have for BA.5 so far suggests the virus replicates more efficiently in human lung cell cultures than the Omicron subvariant BA.2, and infection experiments on hamsters suggest it may cause more severe infection than BA.2. That said, there's really no evidence to suggest BA.5 is deadlier than any previous version.11

BA.5 Triggers Calls for More Boosters

Despite the fact that BA.5 was a predicted outgrowth of pressure from mass "vaccination," governments around the world are doubling down on the failed strategy of boosters. As reported by Time magazine, July 11, 2022:12

"European regulators are urging second booster doses of COVID-19 vaccines for people over 60 years old as cases and hospitalizations are again rising sharply ... Weekly case rates among people age 65 and over increased 32% in 22 of the 24 reporting countries in the week ending July 3 compared to the previous week ...
The [European Medicines] agency said that, at present, there is no clear evidence to support giving a second booster to people under 60 who are not at higher risk of severe disease ...
Separately, EMA Executive Director Emer Cooke said work is under way toward possible approval of vaccines adapted to counter newer variants in September."

Two days later, July 13, 2022, the Biden administration followed suit, announcing all adults, including those under 50, will be eligible for a second booster this fall, to quell worries about waning immunity. The announcement came just one week after Biden signed a $3.2 billion agreement with Pfizer for 105 million doses that will target Omicron subvariants BA.4 and BA.5.13

BA.5 May Soon Be Old News

Interestingly, as rapidly as BA.5 took over the world, it's already on pace to be replaced by another strain with the designation BA.2.75. In a second July 11, 2022, article, Time reported:14

"The quickly changing coronavirus has spawned yet another super contagious Omicron mutant ... BA.2.75 ... may be able to spread rapidly and get around immunity from vaccines and previous infection.
It's unclear whether it could cause more serious disease than other Omicron variants, including the globally prominent BA.5 ... Fueling experts' concerns are a large number of mutations separating this new variant from Omicron predecessors.
Some of those mutations are in areas that relate to the spike protein and could allow the virus to bind onto cells more efficiently, [director of clinical virology at the Mayo Clinic, Matthew] Binnicker said.
Another concern is that the genetic tweaks may make it easier for the virus to skirt past antibodies — protective proteins made by the body in response to a vaccine or infection from an earlier variant."

Reinfection Is the New Club With Which They'll Beat Us Down

As discussed in "Omicron Variant and Vaccine Resistance," Omicron initially arose in "fully vaccinated" patients, raising suspicions that the mass vaccination campaign itself was driving the rapid mutation of the virus.

A problem we now face is that these newer strains all appear to be able to break through both natural and artificial defenses, i.e., both natural immunity and COVID jab-related antibodies, resulting in repeat infections.15

By that I don't mean we're facing reinfection with a dangerous virus. That's not the case. We're essentially looking at endemics of something similar to the common cold; the main difference being that it's no longer seasonal.

No, the real problem is that authorities are responding to COVID as if it was a deadly plague, and are using what are essentially cold symptoms to lock down economies and strip people of their rights and freedoms, over and over again.

Newer variants, such as BA.5 and BA.2.75, have all developed ways to circumvent our immune defenses, including natural immunity, and this unfortunate and largely manmade circumstance now provides the fearmongerers with fresh fodder.

That reinfection with SARS-CoV-2 is possible isn't really a great surprise. The coronavirus, after all, is the virus responsible for the common cold, and throughout history, there have been people who have succumbed to more than one cold episode in a given year.

What's surprising is that governments are willing to destroy economies, the education of children, mental health and the very notion of democracy over endemic cold symptoms. Unless run by clinically insane individuals and/or hypochondriacs, no government would do such a thing.

Assuming world leaders are free of such diagnoses, the fact that they're doing these things suggests there's an entirely different reason behind their actions. COVID just happens to be the only excuse available, so they have no choice but to milk it for all it's worth, even if it makes no sense from a medical perspective.

When Will the Fearmongering End? When You Stop Responding

In January 2022, it looked as though the COVID-19 narrative had crumbled past the point of no return, as many health officials and world leaders finally acknowledged the COVID shots couldn't end the pandemic and that we had to "learn to live with the virus." Some even started speaking out against repeated boosters.

I discussed this in "Are We at the End of the Pandemic?" A major driver for that U-turn in the pandemic narrative was the emergence of the Omicron variant. While incredibly infectious, it caused only mild cold symptoms in the vast majority of people, leaving natural herd immunity in its wake.

Alas, newer variants, such as BA.5 and BA.2.75, have all developed ways to circumvent our immune defenses, including natural immunity, and this unfortunate and largely manmade circumstance now provides the fearmongerers with fresh fodder.

So, at this point, it seems the pandemic will remain a key justification for a "Great Reset" of societal norms, medicine, finance, transportation, food and the rest. In my estimation, the only way to eliminate this "Trojan Horse" justification once and for all is for the people of the world to cease fearing COVID.

As long as the fear of infection persists, it will be used to control and enslave us. In other words, the pandemic narrative will continue to be used for evil ends until and unless people start fearing global tyranny more than they fear a case of fever and sniffles, and respond accordingly.
 

Heliobas Disciple

TB Fanatic
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BOLDING IN ORIGINAL - NOT MINE

Q&A #21 : Does the C-19 vaccine prejudice the innate antibody response of children to different degrees based on the similarities of the various glycosolated pathogens they will later encounter?
By Geert Vanden Bossche
July 20, 2022

Question:

For those children who, unfortunately, have gotten a Covid-19 vaccine, does this one hijacking (the shot(s) and subsequent infections that are not neutralized) of their immune response prejudice their innate antibody response to different degrees based on the similarities of the various glycosolated pathogens they will later encounter?


Answer:

The problem comes from the infection-enhancing antibodies (IEAbs). As viral infection rates are only climbing, and as these Abs render vaccinees highly susceptible to infection, more and more vaccinees are now sitting on high titers of these Abs. Children who have gotten a Covid-19 vaccine will, of course, not be an exception. Because the IEAbs will continuously outcompete the innate Abs, the latter will not manage to educate the cell-based innate immune system (NK cells) on how to recognize a SC-2 infected host cell at an early stage of infection at a time where innate Abs are no longer functional or already overridden by foreign-centered immune cells. The latter can now happen very rapidly due to ADEI, which basically drives the virus into the adaptive immune system and promotes stimulation of foreign-centered T and B cells. This also applies to host cells infected by other glycosylated viruses that generate acute self-limiting infection/ disease because the patterns these viruses express on the surface of infected host cells are shared.

So the answer is yes, these children are at high risk of suffering from irreversible deficiency of their innate immune system to recognize ‘foreign’ from ‘self’. When you prevent innate immune effector cells from learning how to recognize self-mimicking patterns expressed on host cells infected by glycosylated viruses for a long enough period, these NK cells will never be able to recognize such viruses, nor will they be able to recognize ‘altered self’ patterns expressed on pathologically altered host cells. Unfortunately, the latter inability opens the door to immune pathology and cancer.
 

Heliobas Disciple

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Nasal spray lowers Covid viral load by 94 per cent in 24 hours: Lancet study
Nitric Oxide blocks entry into nasal passage, kills the virus and stops its replication, says the study
New Delhi, July 14

A nasal spray administered in high-risk adult COVID-19 patients in India reduced viral load by 94 per cent within 24 hours and 99 per cent in 48 hours, according to the results of Phase-3 trial of the drug published in The Lancet Regional Health Southeast Asia journal.

The study on Nitric Oxide Nasal Spray (NONS) was conducted by Mumbai-based pharmaceutical company Glenmark in 306 vaccinated and unvaccinated adults with symptomatic mild COVID-19 across 20 clinical sites in India.

The trial evaluated a seven-day treatment of NONS plus standard of care versus placebo nasal spray and standard care in patients with symptomatic COVID-19. NONS was self-administered six times daily as two sprays per nostril for seven days.

The study was conducted during the Delta and Omicron surges. The research found that high-risk patients who received NONS had significant reduction in viral load within 24 hours, which was sustained over seven days of treatment.

Viral load was reduced by 93.7 per cent within 24 hours and by 99 per cent within 48 hours of treatment with NONS. Similar results were observed in vaccinated and unvaccinated populations, the authors said.

“The robust double-blind trial demonstrated significant efficacy and remarkable safety of NONS,” Monika Tandon, Senior VP & Head - Clinical Development, Glenmark, and one of the authors of the study said.

“This therapy has the potential to make a crucial contribution to COVID-19 management, with its ease of use in the current highly transmissible phase of pandemic,” Tandon said in a statement.

NONS was launched in India under the brand name FabiSpray in February, after it received manufacturing and marketing approval from the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) as part of the accelerated approval process.

Nitric Oxide blocks entry into the nasal passage, kills the virus, and stops its replication, which is why viral load is reduced so rapidly with NONS, the statement said.

The median time to viral cure was three days in the NONS group and seven days in the placebo group after the start of the treatment, it said.

The proportion of immediate contacts having a positive COVID-19 test or becoming symptomatic, remained nearly the same in the NONS group while it numerically increased in the placebo group over the treatment, the authors added.
 

Heliobas Disciple

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Trust Issues, Sensible Medicine, Ideologic Possession | The VPZD Show Ep. 23

(fair use applies)

How Can We Know Who To Trust In Medicine?
The VPZD Show Ep. 23 (Early Exclusive for Sensible Medicine)

Zubin Damania and Vinay Prasad
11 hr ago

How can anyone determine who is trustworthy when it comes to medical information? In this episode of The VPZD Show we talk about:
  • Our new project Sensible Medicine and its role in medical sense-making
  • Untangling the complexities of health system change
  • Angry doctor Covidian tweets with magical thinking and religiosity
  • The dangers of over-testing and over-treatment with regards to routine blood work
  • Haidt’s 3 Great Untruths and attendant cognitive distortions
  • Pandemic response and its effect on true progressives
  • The consequences of ideological possession
  • How Vinay reviews the trustworthiness of sources
  • The difficulties of “debunking”
  • The monkeypox situation, and much more!
  • Video version (unlisted on YouTube):

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jmebULFQWyw
Trust Issues, Sensible Medicine, Ideologic Possession | The VPZD Show Ep. 23
1 hr 22 min 59 sec
Unlisted
Jul 20, 2022
ZDoggMD


How can you determine who is trustworthy when it comes to medical information? Our new project Sensible Medicine, untangling the complexities of health care reform, angry doctor Covidian tweets with magical thinking and religiosity, the dangers of over-testing and over-treatment with regards to routine blood work, Haidt’s 3 Great Untruths and cognitive distortions, pandemic response effect on true progressives, the consequences of ideological possession, how Vinay reviews the trustworthiness of sources, the difficulties of “debunking”, the monkeypox situation, and much more! Check out our new Substack collaboration, Sensible Medicine: https://sensiblemed.substack.com/ Our VPZD Show podcast: https://link.chtbl.com/vpzd Dr. Prasad's "Plenary Session" podcast: vinayakkprasad.com/plenarysession Dr. Damania's "ZDoggMD Show" podcast: zdoggmd.com/z-blogg
 
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