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Indian Scientists Studying Long-term Memory of Covid-19 Vaccines

by www.news18.com Leave a Comment

The Department of Biotechnology (DBT) is studying long-term memory of COVID-19 vaccines, a senior official said on Monday. The study is aimed at ascertaining the long-tern impact of the vaccines and will help modulate the schedule of doses, the official said.

”Earlier, the vaccines which were used were tried and studied for a longer period of time,” the official said. A senior scientist said Covid vaccine data is being collected from several laboratories and studied by the DBT.

A total of 197 crore COVID-19 vaccine doses have been administered in the country so far.

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Vaccine expert in dire warning over next pandemic as known virus ‘could cause outbreak’

by www.express.co.uk Leave a Comment

AstraZeneca vaccine: Dr Green shares what’s in Oxford jab

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She said: “We need to be better prepared in many different areas. In vaccine development, there are viruses we already know can cause disease outbreaks, yet we don’t yet have a vaccine against them. “We should be developing vaccines now against all those and having them ready so that if there is an outbreak, we’ve got the vaccine to cope with it.

Alongside anticipating the next outbreak, it is important to not become complacent about COVID-19, which still has the potential to resurge in a more severe form, Dame Sarah said.

She explained: “The truth is that we don’t know where COVID-19 is going next.

“It could continue to become milder or it could become a more severe disease again.

“Anticipating what the virus will do next is the job of those who do surveillance in epidemiology.

“But if a new sequence is thought to be becoming dominant, our problem is that making a new version of the vaccine takes time and has to be tested and approved.”

Dame Sarah Gilbert

Dame Sarah Gilbert has warned that we now need to make preparations for the next pandemic (Image: Getty Images)

Phials of the AstraZeneca Covid vaccine

Dame Sarah was one of the research heroes behind the AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine (Image: Getty Images)

According to Dame Sarah, a key challenge posed by coronavirus is that the virus has evolved new strains too quickly as we move through one wave after another.

She told the Guardian: “Regulators cannot approve a vaccine unless they can see the clinical data.

“Then you have to scale up manufacturing to produce the vaccine in quantity.

“Developers are still using the original vaccines, which are supplying good protection against the disease.”

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An infographic about the different vaccines

According to Dame Sarah, a key challenge posed by coronavirus is that the virus evolves rapidly (Image: Express.co.uk)

A discarded face mask

Dame Sarah said that she had “more or less” stopped wearing her own mask (Image: Getty Images)

Asked whether the UK had become over-reliant on the efficacy of Covid vaccines and “slipshod” in largely giving up the wearing of face masks, Dame Sarah said that she had “more or less” stopped wearing her own mask.

She said: “I had about a year of always following the guidance. But, recently, there hasn’t been any guidance.

“I’ve travelled on the tube without a mask. I got Covid, for the first time, about 10 days ago.

“It was like having an unpleasant cold and didn’t worry me. It only lasted a few days and I was fine again.”

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The cover of Vaxxers

Pictured: the cover of Dame Sarah’s new book, ‘Vaxxers: A Pioneering Moment in Scientific History’ (Image: Amazon)

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Dr Gilbert said that those people wary of the vaccination might — from a psychological standpoint — have been pushing against months of being told how to live during lockdown.

She added: “In some countries, people do not want to be vaccinated because their government recommends it and they don’t trust their government.

“I don’t think that was a feature in the UK because, whatever people’s view on [the] government, they recognise the input of the NHS.

“But a lot of the hesitancy among younger people was because they were receiving misinformation, sometimes through friends whose opinions they trusted.”

Professor Gilbert’s new book about the development of the AstraZeneca vaccine, “ Vaxxers: A Pioneering Moment in Scientific History ”, was co-authored with fellow Oxford researcher Dr Catherine Green and is available now.

US grapples with whether to modify COVID vaccine for fall

by www.sfgate.com Leave a Comment

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U.S. health authorities are facing a critical decision: whether to offer new COVID-19 booster shots this fall that are modified to better match recent changes of the shape-shifting coronavirus.

Moderna and Pfizer have tested updated shots against the super-contagious omicron variant, and advisers to the Food and Drug Administration will debate Tuesday if it’s time to make a switch — setting the stage for similar moves by other countries.

“This is science at its toughest,” FDA vaccine chief Dr. Peter Marks told The Associated Press, adding that a final decision is expected within days of the advisory panel’s recommendation.

Current COVID-19 vaccines saved millions of lives around the world in just their first year of use. And the Moderna and Pfizer shots still offer strong protection against the worst outcomes — severe illness and death — especially after a booster dose.

But those vaccines target the original coronavirus strain and between waning immunity and a relentless barrage of variants, protection against infections has dropped markedly. The challenge is deciding if tweaked boosters offer a good chance of blunting another surge when there’s no way to predict which mutant will be the main threat.

In an analysis prepared for Tuesday’s meeting, FDA officials acknowledged targeting last winter’s version of omicron is “somewhat outdated” since it already has been replaced by its even more contagious relatives.

“We would obviously like to get it right enough,” Marks said, so that with one more shot “we get a full season of protection.”

Many experts say updated boosters promise at least a little more benefit.

“It is more likely to be helpful” than simply giving additional doses of today’s vaccine, said epidemiologist William Hanage of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

That’s assuming the virus doesn’t throw another curve ball.

“We’re following rather than getting ahead which is so vexing — that we haven’t come up with a better variant-proof vaccine,” said Dr. Eric Topol, head of the Scripps Research Translational Institute, who has urged a major government push for next-generation immunizations.

Adding to concern about a winter COVID-19 wave is that about half of Americans eligible for that all-important first booster dose never got it. An updated version might entice some of them.

But “we do need to change our expectations,” said Dr. William Moss of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, who noted that studies early in the pandemic raised unrealistic hopes of blocking even the mildest infections. “Our strategy can’t be booster doses every couple of months, even every six months, to prevent infections.”

The top candidates are what scientists call “bivalent” shots — a combination of the original vaccine plus omicron protection.

That’s because the original vaccines do spur production of at least some virus-fighting antibodies strong enough to cross-react with newer mutants — in addition to their proven benefits against severe disease, said University of Pennsylvania immunologist E. John Wherry.

“Being able to push the boost response a little bit in one direction or the other without losing the core is really important,” he said.

Moderna and Pfizer found their combo shots substantially boosted levels of omicron-fighting antibodies in adults who’d already had three vaccinations, more than simply giving another regular dose.

Recipients also developed antibodies that could fight omicron’s newest relatives named BA.4 and BA.5, although not nearly as many. It’s not clear how much protection that will translate into, and for how long.

Antibodies are a key first layer of defense that form after vaccination or a prior infection. They can prevent infection by recognizing the outer coating of the coronavirus — the spike protein — and blocking it from entering your cells.

But antibodies naturally wane and each new variant comes with a different-looking spike protein, giving it a better chance of evading detection by remaining antibodies. Separate studies published this month in Nature and the New England Journal of Medicine show the newest omicron relatives are even better at dodging antibodies — both in the vaccinated and in people who recovered from the original omicron.

That first booster people were supposed to get strengthened immune memory, helping explain why protection against hospitalization and death is proving more durable. If the virus sneaks past antibodies, different defenders called T cells spring into action, attacking infected cells to curb illness.

“T cells recognize the virus in a fundamentally different way,” not hunting for disguised spike protein but for parts of the virus that so far haven’t been altered as much, said Penn’s Wherry.

Still, as people get older, all parts of their immune system gradually weaken. There’s little data on how long T cell protection against COVID-19 lasts or how it varies with different mutations or vaccines.

Wherry and dozens of other scientists recently petitioned the FDA to quit focusing solely on antibodies and start measuring T cells as it decides vaccination strategy.

The Biden administration has made clear that it needs Congress to provide more money so that if the FDA clears updated boosters, the government can buy enough for every American who wants one. And Dr. Anthony Fauci, the government’s top infectious disease expert, told Congress last week more research funding also is critical to create better next-generation vaccines, such as nasal versions that might better block infection in the nose or more variant-proof shots.

“The virus is changing and we need to keep up with it,” Fauci, said.

___

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

PH economic recovery seen slowing without easing of COVID-19 quarantine, crawling vaccination program

by business.inquirer.net Leave a Comment

MANILA, Philippines—The Philippine economy was projected to grow at a slower pace in the first quarter of 2021, compared to an increase in output in the fourth quarter of 2020, as a result of a decision to keep in place current COVID-19 quarantine restrictions until an elusive mass vaccination is rolled out.

In a statement on Tuesday (Feb. 23), acting Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Karl Kendrick Chua said the state planning agency National Economic and Development Authority (Neda), which he heads, “supports the recent decision of the President not to shift to MGCQ” or modified general community quarantine. MGCQ is the least stringent level of restrictions to prevent transmission of SARS Cov2, the virus that causes COVID-19 and which had turned humans as its carriers.

Last week, Chua urged President Rodrigo Duterte to place the entire Philippines under MGCQ to address higher rates of hunger and unemployment in areas under stricter quarantine measures, which included business and financial hub Metro Manila, amid a still elevated number of COVID-19 infections.

Chua told the Inquirer last Sunday (Feb. 21) that a uniform, nationwide MGCQ would allow as much as 95 percent of economic activities to resume.

But the President on Monday (Feb. 22) said the whole country cannot move to a more relaxed quarantine without a mass vaccination program in place.

Chua said “the whole of government will work hard, in cooperation with various sectors, to roll-out the vaccine so that we can further open the economy.”

In a Feb. 22 report, UK-based Oxford Economics projected the Philippines’ GDP to eke out about 1 percent in quarter-on-quarter growth during the first quarter of 2021.

However, this increase in output would be slower than the 5.6-percent quarter-on-quarter growth posted in the fourth quarter of 2020.

During the third quarter of 2020, GDP rose 8 percent compared to the economic trough in the second quarter, when 75 percent of the economy froze under the most stringent enhanced community quarantine (ECQ) imposed from mid-March to May 2020.

The Philippines would nonetheless be among a few countries whose first-quarter GDP would exceed the previous quarter’s output, as Oxford Economics said “a large number of economies that expanded in the fourth quarter [of 2020] are expected to shrink in the first quarter [of 2021].”

Globally, “the broad slowdown in the first quarter is largely a reaction to tighter activity restrictions” as new and more contagious virus variants were detected at the start of the year, said Ben May, Oxford Economics director of global macro research, in a report.

In a separate Feb. 22 report, Oxford Economics head of global strategy and emerging market macro research Gabriel Sterne and economist Tianchen Peng pointed to “upside” risks to GDP in bigger emerging markets like the Philippines, Brazil, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Mexico, and South Africa.

However, economic scars wrought by COVID-19 may take longer to heal in the Philippines, Colombia, Peru, and Spain, they said in their report.

Also, UK-based Capital Economics on Tuesday (Feb. 23) said that while new coronavirus cases seemed to have peaked in the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia, “the slow vaccine rollout means that restrictions will need to remain in place for longer, holding back the economic recovery” in these three countries.

Capital Economics senior Asia economist Gareth Leather and Asia economist Alex Holmes pointed out that mass inoculation had yet to start in the Philippines.

Across Asia, “production delays and administrative problems are likely to hold back the rollout” as  “many countries are unlikely to get a steady supply of vaccines until the second half of the year.”

“Vaccine hesitancy could also delay the rollout,” said Capital Economics in a report.

It cited a YouGov survey which showed than less than half of the population of Hong Kong, Taiwan and the Philippines “would definitely take a vaccine if one was offered.”

“Our working assumption is that for most places it will take around 12 months for the most vulnerable to be vaccinated,” Capital Economics said in its report.

“Overall, the slow vaccine rollout reinforces our view that most economies will remain depressed for some time to come, and that policy will need to remain supportive,” it said.

“We expect central banks in Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia and Vietnam to cut interest rates further over the coming months, and that policy rates in the rest of the region will remain at very low levels for the considerable future. Fiscal policy will also remain loose—there is little sign of policymakers wanting to tighten fiscal policy prematurely,” Capital Economics said.

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Novak Djokovic Won’t Get Covid-19 Vaccination For U.S. Open

by www.forbes.com Leave a Comment

Novak Djokovic has no plans to get the Covid-19 vaccine ahead of the U.S. Open and as of now wouldn’t be eligible to enter the U.S. for the final Grand Slam of the year.

Under current rules, unvaccinated foreigners can’t enter the U.S.

“Hopefully I can have a very good tournament [at Wimbledon], as I have done in the last three editions,” said Djokovic, who has won the last three Wimbledons in 2018, ‘19 and ‘21 and owns 20 major titles.

“Then I’ll just have to wait and see. I would love to go to States. But as of today, that’s not possible. There is not much I can do anymore. I mean, it’s really up to the U.S. government to make a decision whether or not they allow unvaccinated people to go into the country.”

Djokovic, who has had Covid twice, was deported ahead of the Australian Open in January because he was not vaccinated and was not allowed in the U.S . for Indian Wells and Miami in March.

He opens play at Wimbledon on Monday as the defending champ and No. 1 seed, and is drawn to meet No. 2 seed Rafael Nadal , owner of a men’s record 22 majors, in the final.

This could be the last major of the year for the 35-year-old Djokovic, who hasn’t won a Grand Slam singles title since beating Matteo Berrettini in the Wimbledon final a year ago. He lost in the U.S. Open final to Daniil Medvedev while he was one match shy of completing the calendar Slam, missed playing in Australia and lost in the Roland Garros quarterfinals to Nadal.

“That is an extra motivation to do well here,” he said of Wimbledon.

Djokovic still has time to get vaccinated ahead of the start of the U.S. Open on Aug. 29. Asked by a reporter if he had “completely closed your mind to that as an option,” he said, “Yes.”