COVID-19

Epidemiologists’ `Math’ Says Vaccinate More Before Any Boosters

August 22, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in COVID-19, Economic development updates, General updates, Healthcare, Healthcare

Epidemiologists’ `Math’ Says Vaccinate More Before Any Boosters–

Aug. 22 (EIRNS) — A low-key op-ed by two epidemiologists, “Boosters won’t stop the Delta variant: Here’s the math”, was published back on Aug. 15 in the Washington Post. While focused on the United States, if applied to the entire world’s population it appears to provide substantiation for focusing all available and contracted vaccine supplies on the basic vaccination of citizens before giving any booster shots. The premise of their analysis: “Many vaccinated people are asking whether it’s time to get a booster dose. But the math behind the spread of infectious diseases like COVID-19 can help us see that it’s not.”

The argument: The basic reproductive number R0 or the original virus in this pandemic — the number of people likely to be infected by each infectious person if there is no immunity in the population — was 3; of the Delta variant, it is estimated at 6-9. Re is the effective reproductive number, which is R0 multiplied by the share of the population which is susceptible to the disease, and which must be kept at 1 or lower to keep the epidemic from spreading. The susceptible portion of the population can be expressed by [1-xv], where 1 is the whole population (or adult population), x is the percentage of people fully vaccinated and v is the vaccines’ effectiveness. Then the effective reproductive number of the virus, Re, is R0 times [1-xv]. This Re is a direct measure of how fast and how far the Delta variant infections, hospitalizations and deaths spread.

Taking the Delta variant’s R0 as 8 and the vaccine effectiveness as 85%, Re would be just 1.2 if the entire target population were fully vaccinated. At 52% fully vaccinated (where the United States is now), Re for Delta is about 4, worse than the original virus variant when no one at all was immune. If a booster shot is assumed to raise vaccine effectiveness to 95%, then Re with the currently vaccinated population, if they were all to be boosted, is still about 4.

But if 75% of the target population were to become fully vaccinated, the Re number drops below 3. If 85% were vaccinated, with no boosters, Re would be about 2.4, even having assumed an R0 value which is near the top of the range for the Delta variant.

In other words, there is a huge field for increasing x, the proportion of people vaccinated; relative to the small range for increasing v, the vaccines’ effectiveness, by booster shots; and this determines how the spread of the Delta variant of COVID can be arrested. It would seem to apply to the population of all the world’s nations, as well as to that of Americans.

The authors are Prof. Eleanor Murray, Boston Univ. School of Public Health; and her doctoral student Ruby Barnard-Mayers.

Media Starts Catching on to Biden’s Ridiculous Vaccine Hoarding

March 31, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in COVID-19, General updates, Healthcare

Mar. 29 (EIRNS)–For two months, the Biden administration COVID-19 vaccine policy has been to grab as many vaccines as possible and turn away any and all requests for help. Then in March, various statements, either from President Biden or his White House spokesperson, Jen Psaki, made clear that America would consider requests after every American is taken care of. It’s been left unclear whether that’s every adult who would roll up their sleeve (around 200 million) or, literally, every American (330 million) or somewhere in between. However, this last week has seen several articles beginning to question the ugly and counterproductive stance. One can pretend that viruses don’t mutate and create new strains that will outflank one’s vaccines, but it is a silly conceit.
One of them, for example, an Axios’s article by Dave Lawler, used vaccine production figures from Airfinity, and compared production vs. export of vaccines: the United States produced 27% of the world’s vaccines and exported 0% of their production; China, 33% and 62% of that exported. (With this week’s plan to ship 4 million doses to Mexico and Canada, the U.S. climbs to about 1.5%.) India and Russia also had significant export figures. Biden’s prime tool has been to invoke the Defense Production Act to keep our ammunition away from allies and foe alike. One European diplomat expressed surprise that there was so little domestic opposition to Biden’s ‘Americans first’ approach. Krishna Udayakumar, director of the Duke Global Health Innovation Center, summed it up: “The question really is, what is the threshold that’s going to satisfy the administration enough to allow the exporting of those doses?”

Brazil COVID Crisis Careens Out of Control

March 29, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in COVID-19, Economic development updates, General updates, Healthcare

Brazil COVID Crisis Careens Out of Control

March 28 (EIRNS) – Numerous Brazilian medical and other authorities are sounding the alarm that the COVID pandemic in Brazil is careening out of the control, threatening not only the country but the entire planet. At present, one in every four COVID deaths worldwide is occurring in Brazil. “Before, the risk factor to dying from Covid-19 was being older, having some co-morbidity,” said Domingos Alves, a professor of medicine who’s part of a national monitoring group. “Now, the risk is being Brazilian,” Bloomberg reported.

The mortality rate in Brazil has risen from 2% at the end of last year to 3.1% in mid March, according to Fiocruz, one of the country’s leading R&D centers in epidemiology. That is more than a 50% increase in less than three months. Only 7% of the population have received a vaccine shot; 2% are fully vaccinated. More than 300,000 Brazilians have died of Covid to date; some experts expect the half-million mark to be hit by June, and for Brazil to surpass the U.S. in deaths by the end of the year – a grim achievement.

An alarming new trend is a sharp rise in the number and proportion of younger Brazilians who are getting sick and dying from Covid – this in a country that is largely young. According to official statistics, from Jan. 1 to mid March the rate of new cases among those aged 30 to 59 rose by nearly twice the national average of 316%. Deaths in those age groups jumped by at least 317%, compared with 223% for Brazil as a whole.

Scientists are still trying to figure out why that is happening. One theory is that younger patients wait longer to seek health care and are sicker when they arrive at the hospital. Another factor may relate to the new variants appearing in Brazil. Bloomberg cited Jaques Sztajnbok, who helps run the ICU at Sao Paulo’s Emílio Ribas hospital, one of Brazil’s main facilities for infectious diseases, saying that patients are largely getting sick with the variant that first appeared in the Amazonian city of Manaus or the U.K. one, both of which are more contagious than the original strain.

“Fernando Brum, a director at Sorocaba’s Santa Casa hospital [near Sao Paulo], said the mutation of the virus into a much more contagious version with a viral load that makes people sick in a faster and more aggressive way has meant young people have gone from mostly asymptomatic cases to being gravely affected… `The intensive care unit is constantly and uninterruptedly occupied,’ he [Brum] said. Patients in their 30s make up at least half of those beds, and their average time spent in the hospital has tripled from last year. It has come down recently for a grim reason — patients are dying more quickly.”

The country’s health system is on the brink of total collapse. Miguel Nicolelis, professor of Neurobiology at Duke University who advised several Brazilian governors and mayors on pandemic control, told AP: “We have surpassed levels never imagined for a country with a public health care system, a history of efficient immunization campaigns and health workers who are second to none in the world. The next stage is the health system collapse.”

Brazil’s state-run science and technology institute, Fiocruz, on Tuesday called for a 14-day lockdown to reduce transmission by 40%. “We need to open our eyes and understand this is no joke,” Rio’s Mayor Eduardo Paes said in a recorded message on the eve of a 10-day shutdown in that city. “People are dying and, if everything continues as is, nothing is done, God only knows what could happen. No one knows this disease’s limit. No one knows how many variants could emerge.”

China Announces Two Billion COVID-19 Vaccines to Be Exported in 2021

August 8, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in China, COVID-19, Economic development updates, General updates, Global Diplomacy, Healthcare, Healthcare

China Announces Two Billion COVID-19 Vaccines to Be Exported in 2021—

Aug. 6 (EIRNS)–President Xi Jinping announced today that China will export two billion COVID-19 vaccines in 2021. The massive expansion of production capacity this year has allowed China to export between 600 to 750 million doses so far, while also applying over 1.7 billion doses within China. The track record of Sinovac and Sinopharm so far indicates that they will produce almost 5 billion doses this year, and Tao Lina, a vaccine expert in Shanghai confirms this. Otherwise, China is presently vaccinating their population at the rate of 17.9 million shots a day, which is seven times the rate of the European Union, and 30 times that of the United States.

President Xi sent a written message today to the International Forum on Covid-19 Vaccine Cooperation, hosted by China Central Television and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang-Yi. He described the vaccine as a “global public good,” and stressed common action on world health as part of building a community with a shared future for mankind. He recognized the problem with the resurgences of the coronavirus allowing for the proliferation of mutations and variant strains. Besides exporting vaccines, he described China’s work with countries to develop and produce vaccines, with joint production already begun in the UAE, Indonesia, Malaysia, Egypt, Brazil, Turkey, Pakistan and Mexico — a new capacity of over 200 million doses, which needs further expansion.

World Health Organization: COVID-19 Vaccine Rollout To Accelerate in Africa

August 6, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in COVID-19, General updates, Healthcare, Healthcare

World Health Organization: COVID-19 Vaccine Rollout To Accelerate in Africa—

Aug. 5, 2021 (EIRNS) – A World Health Organization article published in Consortium News July 30 reports on the 520 million vaccine doses that will be shipped to Africa by the end of 2021 by COVAX. Can they be administered in that 4-plus-month time frame by the public health systems of the African countries? That is a vital question.

Ethiopian biologist Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organization, said that poorer countries worldwide have administered, on average, 1.5 shots per 100 people, while developed countries have administered 100 shots for 100 people, on average.

Up to the present, only 79 million COVID doses have arrived in Africa, and 21 million people, or just (1.6 percent) of Africa’s population are fully vaccinated.

COVID-19: Brazil Now “Threat to Global Public Health”

March 26, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in COVID-19, Economic development updates, General updates, Geopolitics updates, Healthcare

“Brazil Now Represents a Threat to Global Public Health”: Brazilian Epidemiologist

March 25 (EIRNS) — Dr. Pedro Hallal, an epidemiologist and Dean at the Federal University of Pelotas in southern Brazil, stated that “Brazil now represents a threat to global public health” that must be urgently addressed by international action. Hallal is the coordinator of Epicovid-19, the largest epidemiological study into the coronavirus in Brazil. Hallal stated that the pandemic is out of control in Brazil, which is now a breeding ground for dangerous new variants. “The virus is circulating so widely in Brazil that it is possible, and I would say likely, that new variants will appear in the near future. We need to stop that urgently,” he said.

Hallal called for an international task force to address the crisis, since the policies of the Brazilian government of Jair Bolsonaro have brought the country to the brink of collapse. If not, “global efforts to control COVID-19 will be jeopardized,” he said.

An open letter from hundreds of leading financial figures in Brazil, including former ministers and five former presidents of Brazil’s Central Bank, also slammed Bolsonaro’s COVID policy and demanded urgent change. Without ever mentioning Bolsonaro by name, the letter is clear, attacking Brazil’s “top political leadership” which displays “a disdain for science, looks to remedies without evidence of their effectiveness, encourages crowds, and flirts with the anti-vax movement.” They demand a nationally coordinated policy of social distancing, including a national lockdown if necessary.

Bolsonaro is feeling the heat, and has reluctantly agreed to meet with Brazil’s governors – who universally oppose his do-nothing policy and have tried to impose state-by-state measures – and has even promised to start a serious vaccination campaign (so far, less than 7% of Brazilians have had one dose of a vaccine). In over half of the country’s 26 states, the rate of occupancy in ICUs tops 90%. Last Tuesday, daily deaths in the country topped 3,000 for the first time, with 3,251 deaths recorded. Brazil now accounts for one out of every four deaths worldwide from COVID. The biomedical research institution Fiocruz, a week ago reported that Brazil’s public health systems are “living through the worst collapse in history.”

“The situation is very, very concerning,” said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the World Health Organization. “Brazil has to take it seriously.” Dr. Hallal stated: “If we do not have enough vaccines in the next 30 to 45 days, the situation will be terrible — not only for Brazil, but for the rest of the world.”

Putin: Mobilize Science & Industry to Defeat COVID

March 26, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in COVID-19, Economic development updates, General, General updates, Global Diplomacy, Healthcare, Russia

Putin’s Conference on Defeating COVID-19 by Outflanking the New Strains

Mar. 25 (EIRNS)–Russian President Vladimir Putin held a videoconference earlier this week on the scientific and industrial mobilization needed to expand COVID-19 vaccine production, and to attack the virus. By way of introduction, he said that their Sputnik V vaccine, now approved in 55 countries representing 1.4 billion people, would expand to 2.5 billion people shortly. He celebrated the latest contract with India for production of another 100 million doses, “the news of the day.” Now there are contracts for the production of 1.4 billion doses. For their own population, Russia is aiming for 139.6 million doses and, as of last week, have 40.2 million.

The Industry and Trade Minister Denis Manturov said that production is ramping up. April should see 17 million more doses. They also have manufacturing agreements in 10 countries. Further, their new EpiVacCorona vaccine is planned for 11 million doses by July. It is designed to be able to hit a wide array of variants. The Healthcare Minister Mikhail Murashko reported on a new version of Sputnik V that can be stored easily at non-frozen temperatures (36-46 degrees Fahrenheit), important for far-flung parts of Russia; and a new Sputnik Light, for trials on 12-17 year olds. The concern there was not-so-much about mortality but about possible and unknown long-term damage to children form COVID-19.

The chairman of the board of Pharstandard, Viktor Kharitonin, reported that their ramping up to 200-300 million doses per year involved recruiting Russian exile scientists back to Russia for the war against the virus: “Over 20 percent of our scientists returned from the EU, the United States and Israel at our invitation and are now helping us develop a modern pharmaceutical industry…”

Gamaleya director Alexander Gintsburg highlighted talks last week, headed by Sergei Razov, Russia’s ambassador to Italy, with Italy’s Spallanzani Institute — “a counterpart of ours” in being the national regulatory institute. They agreed to produce a “draft memorandum of cooperation” to work with Spallanzani’s key resource, “the largest collection of newly emerged and isolated strains of COVID-19 pathogens in Europe…” Plasma samples from people vaccinated with Sputnik V are to be tested for “the neutralizing activity of the serum…” Denis Logunov, Gamaleya deputy director, who actually developed the vaccine, explained that, as with the flu virus, we “examine sera screening from vaccinated patient’s reactions to new strains. I consider this very important… We must not miss the important moment when the virus, for one, gets out of control and the existing vaccines may become even potentially ineffective. In terms of science, I consider this prospect the most important.”

China Institutes More Stringent Measures To Combat New COVID Outbreaks

August 5, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in China, COVID-19, General updates, Healthcare, Healthcare

Aug. 4 (EIRNS)—China is experiencing a resurgence of COVID, particularly of the new delta variant, and is implementing more stringent measures to deal with it. Most seem to have developed through imported cases, at the airport in Nanjing and in the south Yunnan province at the Myanmar border. But the provinces of Zhejiang and Henan, where there has been major flooding recently, have also been hit with new cases. The city of Wuhan is also again in the process of conducting nucleic acid testing on its 11 million people in order to avoid a replay of the terrible 2020 outbreak.

The State Council announced on Aug. 3 that COVID-19 prevention and control would now be “the top priority” for local governments. “Airports, harbors and land borders should be closely guarded to prevent imported COVID-19 cases. International travelers and cargo should be strictly separated from spaces where local people can enter,” Sun Chunlan, a member of the Political Bureau said in her comments at the press conference announcing the new measures.

“People that are most prone to infection should be placed in quarantine immediately. Regional investigations targeting close contacts should be completed within 24 hours,” she said. Sun required nationwide scrutiny of in-hospital infection control measures. “Hospitals that fail to meet the standards should carry out rectification or even suspend operations,” she said. There are now four high-risk areas for the COVID outbreak and 150 medium-risk areas. The country has already distributed 1.7 billion doses of the vaccine.

Florida and Texas Governors Stand Up for the Right To Die of COVID

August 5, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in COVID-19, General updates, Healthcare, Healthcare

Aug. 4 (EIRNS)—Governors Ron DeSantis (FL) and Greg Abbott (TX) are adopting policies in their states worthy of the Flagellant cult of the 14th century. They have each instituted a statewide ban on mask mandates and they have prohibited school districts from requiring masks in schools. Texas has even started fining teachers who dare to ask their students if they are vaccinated, or ask those who are not to mask. In Florida, counties are being threatened that their funding will be pulled if they issue mask mandates, and already that led to Broward County withdrawing its mask mandate.

As a result of this medieval lunacy, among other causes, one-third of all new COVID cases nationwide come from those two states.

DeSantis has also angrily denounced the suggestion that those who are not vaccinated and not masking or social distancing are responsible for getting sick. He insisted: “In Florida, there will be no lockdowns. There will be no school closures. There will be no restrictions and no mandates.”

28 Nations Participate in China’s Belt and Road Partnership on COVID Vaccines Cooperation

August 5, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in Afghanistan, China, COVID-19, Economic development updates, General updates, Global Diplomacy, Healthcare, Healthcare, New Silk Road / BRI updates, Pakistan, Uzbekistan

August 3, 2021 (EIRNS)—On June 23 of this year, at the Asia and Pacific High-Level Conference on Belt and Road Cooperation, presided over by China’s State Councilor and Foreign Minister, Wang Yi, 28 nations joined in launching the China Initiative for Belt and Road Partnership on Covid-19 Vaccine Cooperation. The statement announcing this initiative stressed that international cooperation and solidarity are key to fighting the pandemic, that “people and their lives” must be put first, and that no one is safe until everyone is safe. It emphasized that vaccines must be equitably distributed and that there must be “open, fair and non-discriminatory international cooperation on vaccines.”

A number of other recommendations for the BRI vaccine cooperation initiative included facilitating joint vaccine research, development and technological exchanges; promoting partnerships between vaccine producers and developing countries for joint vaccine production, to scale up global production; encouraging regional and multilateral development banks to provide more concessional financing to developing countries for their vaccine procurement and production; and “strengthening Belt and Road cooperation on connectivity to ensure cross-border flows of vaccines.”

According to the Chinese Foreign Ministry yesterday, in less than two months the BRI vaccine initiative has yielded impressive results, reaching cooperative agreements with several of the initiative’s 28 co-sponsors on a total of 775 million doses of vaccines, including in the form of concentrates, of which 350 million doses have been delivered. In addition, Chinese companies have started joint production with four co-sponsors of this initiative, whose names were not specified, and are discussing joint production “with other interested countries.” In today’s foreign ministry press conference, spokesman Wang Wenbin reported that China has provided vaccine assistance to over 80 countries and vaccines to 40 countries, also reporting that China is collaborating with other developing nations to mass produce the vaccine. It was also announced today that the World Health Organization has granted emergency use authorization to China’s Sinovac vaccine. (The full initiative statement is detailed here.)

The 28 countries include: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Brunei, Cambodia, Chile, China, Colombia, Fiji, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Malaysia, Maldives, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Solomon Islands, Sri Lanka, Tajikistan, Thailand, Turkmenistan, United Arab Emirates, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam.

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