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2023 Forecast: As the COVID Vaccine Market Evolves, What’s Next for the Top Players? + More
2023 Forecast: As the COVID Vaccine Market Evolves, What’s Next for the Top Players?
After nearly three years in a heated race to distribute vaccines and drugs against the most severe pandemic in a century, biopharma’s COVID-19 market fades more and more each quarter. Next year, we’ll see more changes that’ll force the top players to pivot.
In 2020 and 2021, Moderna and Pfizer — with BioNTech at its side — shot out of the gate with their respective mRNA COVID-19 vaccines, quickly earning spots as top moneymakers on the pandemic scene. It’s a story that doesn’t need recapping, but the height of the action seems to be winding down.
2023 should present a challenge for companies hoping to repeat their pandemic sales hauls — and so far companies are staying mum on their expectations. Lee Brown, global sector lead for healthcare at Third Bridge Group, said this fall that the three pandemic superstar companies will “struggle with the transition to the post pandemic environment” as COVID revenues decline alongside earnings.
Meanwhile, as the COVID-19 vaccine race continues to evolve, another vaccine market could begin to unfold in 2023. The respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) race features key players such as Pfizer, GSK, Sanofi and AstraZeneca. The market is said to be worth $10.5 billion over the next decade, SVB Leerink analyst Geoffrey Porges wrote to clients in 2021. At the time, Porges expected GSK to pick up $2.9 billion of that total revenue by 2030, with Pfizer taking $2.1 billion, J&J collecting $1.7 billion and Sanofi snagging $1.2 billion.
State Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo Will Work With UF in COVID Vaccine Research
After a discussion with health experts, the Florida surgeon general announced that the University of Florida will be assisting him in researching the effects of the COVID-19 vaccination. State Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo said he would conduct research through UF to look into the deaths of “healthy” people who died after receiving the COVID-19 vaccine.
In the press release, Ladapo said the Biden Administration and pharmaceutical corporations continue to distribute the mRNA vaccines. “Including children as young as six months old, through relentless propaganda while ignoring real-life adverse events,” Ladapo said.
During the roundtable discussion held on Dec. 13, Ladapo talked about a clinical research study conducted at a university in Germany. Autopsies were conducted on healthy people who died suddenly without any known acute illness after receiving the COVID-19 vaccination. “They looked at four out of 35 people, who actually had myocarditis and it was a type of myocarditis that was different from the typical types of myocarditis,” Ladapo said.
“Specifically it was a type of myocarditis that they attributed to the mRNA COVID-19 vaccines. It is important to know that these people died at home suddenly,” Ladapo said.
Biden Admin Increasing Spending on Vaccine Injury Claims Raises Questions
The U.S. Senate may be poised to pass a $1.7 trillion omnibus spending bill with bipartisan support this week and avoid a government shutdown but one section of the legislation may draw the attention of those skeptical about COVID-19 vaccines. The spending bill provides for more than $15 million for administrative expenses for the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program Trust Fund, which provides funding for the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program.
That program is designed to “compensate vaccine-related injury or death petitions for covered vaccines administered on or after October 1, 1988,” according to the Health Resources & Services Administration (HRSA).
“Last year’s administrative expenses for the vax injury trust fund were $13.2 million — now it’s $15.2 million,” Republican Representative Dan Bishop said. “That’s a 15% increase. Anticipating a 15% increase in vaccine injuries?”
The National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (VICP) does not cover COVID-19 vaccinations and HRSA’s website explains that COVID vaccines are covered under the Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program (CICP).
Drug Price Group Slashes Suggested Price of Pfizer COVID Treatment by 80%
An influential drug pricing research group has cut its suggested price range for Pfizer Inc.’s (PFE.N) COVID-19 antiviral treatment Paxlovid by more than 80%, partly to reflect the decreased disease burden as the Omicron variant of the coronavirus tends to cause less severe illness.
The Institute for Clinical and Economic Review (ICER) said on Tuesday that its new suggested U.S. price based on the benefits and value to patients was in the range of $563 to $906 per treatment course. That compares with its previous assessment of $3,600 to $5,800 per course.
ICER is not a government agency and has no authority to set prices. But many large health insurers take their reports into account when they negotiate prices with drug manufacturers and determine patient access. Drugmakers also take into account ICER estimates when they set prices for new medicines.
BF.7: What to Know About the Omicron COVID Variant
Since the COVID variant Omicron emerged in late 2021, it has rapidly evolved into multiple subvariants. One subvariant, BF.7, has recently been identified as the main variant spreading in Beijing, and is contributing to a wider surge of COVID infections in China.
But what is this new variant, and should we be worried? Although reports from China about this variant’s characteristics are concerning, it doesn’t appear to be growing too much elsewhere in the world. Here’s what we know. BF.7, short for BA.5.2.1.7, is a sub-lineage of the Omicron variant BA.5.
Reports from China indicate BF.7 has the strongest infection ability out of the Omicron subvariants in the country, being quicker to transmit than other variants, having a shorter incubation period, and with greater capacity to infect people who have had a previous COVID infection, or been vaccinated, or both.
To put this into context, BF.7 is believed to have an R0, or basic reproduction number, of 10 to 18.6. This means an infected person will transmit the virus to an average of 10 to 18.6 other people. Research has shown Omicron has an average R0 of 5.08.
Spending Bill Would Revamp Pandemic Response, Medicaid Funding
A sweeping year-end $1.7 trillion congressional spending package would revamp the country’s pandemic response and make major changes to Medicaid policy, among other health provisions.
The legislation includes most of a bipartisan bill from Sens. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) and Richard Burr (R-N.C.) aimed at improving the U.S. preparedness for pandemics after the many shortcomings in the response to COVID-19.
The bill includes changes aimed at improving public health communication and data collection, speeding up the development of vaccines and treatments, and bolstering oversight of health agencies.
But the spending bill notably excludes a measure that would have established a bipartisan task force modeled on the 9/11 Commission to examine the U.S. response to COVID-19 as well as the controversial subject of the origins of the pandemic. Partisan investigations are underway in both chambers, which has dismayed public health advocates who fear no answers will be gained without an independent probe.
Defenses Down: COVID Antibodies in Nose Decline First
U.S. News & World Report reported:
Researchers think they’ve figured out why people can become reinfected with COVID-19, despite immunity gained from either vaccination or a previous infection.
It turns out that antibodies produced in the nose — the first line of defense against respiratory viruses like COVID — decline faster than antibodies found in the bloodstream, British scientists say.
Nasal antibodies tend to drop nine months after COVID-19 infection, while antibodies in the blood last at least a year, according to findings published online Dec. 19 in the journal eBioMedicine.
“While blood antibodies help to protect against disease, nasal antibodies can prevent infection altogether. This might be an important factor behind repeat infections with the SARS-CoV-2 virus and its new variants,” lead researcher Dr. Felicity Liew, from the National Heart and Lung Institute at Imperial College London, added in a college news release.
Long COVID Patients Can Face a Battle Trying to Claim Benefits Through Their Workplace Disability Insurance
Mike Yada was suffering from “long COVID” — a post-infection condition involving a cluster of symptoms that can be disruptive at best and debilitating at worst. More than two years and many doctor’s appointments later, he is still fighting those symptoms.
Yada, who worked in the tech field, also has had to wage another battle: maintaining income replacement through disability insurance, an employee benefit through his now ex-employer. While he recently won an appeal to restore those benefits after the insurer suddenly ended them, he’s not sure it will stick.
An estimated 43% of private industry workers have access to short-term disability insurance through their employer, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. It typically replaces 60% to 100% of an employee’s income, usually for three or six months, said Alex Henry, a national practice leader at Willis Towers Watson, an insurance advisory firm.
Long-term disability insurance, which is intended to kick in when necessary after short-term disability benefits run out, is available to 35% of workers. It usually pays 50% to 70% of a worker’s income — often through retirement age, depending on the specifics.
China’s COVID ‘Chaos’: How a Shortage of Fever Drugs Is Sparking a Global Run on Medicines
An unprecedented wave of COVID infections in China has triggered widespread drug shortages, as people scramble to buy fever medicines and painkillers to alleviate flu-like symptoms.
The panic buying has spread outside mainland China’s borders, with the generic versions of Tylenol and Advil sold out at drugstores in Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan and as far afield as Australia, prompting some local pharmacies to limit sales. Even home remedies such as canned peaches are being snapped up by people looking for ways to fight COVID.
The situation mirrors shortages seen in the United States and Canada over children’s painkillers, which are in high demand because of the proliferation of respiratory viruses.
At five drugstores in the commercial district of Wan Chai, the drug Panadol, the local brand name for Tylenol, has been sold out for two weeks, salespersons told CNN. One salesman, who gave his name as Simon, said the shortage was due to buyers purchasing in bulk to send to their friends and relatives in the mainland.
BioNTech-Pfizer COVID Vaccine Sent to China for Germans
Germany has dispatched a batch of the BioNTech-Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine to China, where it will be administered to Germans who live in the country.
Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s spokesman, Steffen Hebestreit, said the vaccines were sent on a flight that was due to land in China on Wednesday. He said that the Chinese government formally informed Berlin in a diplomatic note that German citizens can be inoculated with the vaccine, which otherwise isn’t cleared for use in China.
In exchange for China’s agreement to allow the limited use of the German-developed BioNTech-Pfizer vaccine, Germany is allowing Chinese citizens in Germany to get the Chinese-made Sinovac vaccine, which hasn’t been approved in the European Union.
Scholz said when he visited Beijing in early November that China would make BioNTech-Pfizer shots available for expatriates and said that can “only be a first step,” indicating that he hoped the vaccine’s use could be expanded to the Chinese public.
Scarlet Fever Outbreak in U.K. Far Bigger Than Previously Thought
A U.K. outbreak of scarlet fever that has prompted shortages of some antibiotics is far more widespread than previously thought, with about 27,000 cases now reported since mid-September.
More than 9,000 cases of the illnesss, caused by group A streptococcus bacteria, were reported in the latest week in England and Wales, according to the U.K. Health Security Agency. The agency also updated a previous tally to add almost 10,000 cases occurring in November and earlier in December.
Former NY Teacher Accused of Injecting Teen With COVID Vaccine Without Parental Consent Avoids Jail Time + More
Former NY Teacher Accused of Injecting Teen With COVID Vaccine Without Parental Consent Avoids Jail Time
A former New York high school teacher accused of injecting a teen with a COVID-19 vaccine at her home without his parents’ knowledge has been sentenced to community service and probation after pleading guilty to a misdemeanor charge.
Laura Russo, 55, was arrested at the beginning of January, and authorities accused her of giving the 17-year-old, the son of someone she knew, a vaccine dose at her residence in Sea Cliff. Newsday reported that Russo later testified in a hearing that she got the dose when a pharmacist gave her expiring doses after she asked for an empty vial to use as a Christmas ornament.
Authorities said the teen later told his parents, who called the police. Prosecutors had initially charged Russo with the unauthorized practice of the profession, a felony with a penalty of up to four years in prison. But on Friday, at a courtroom in Mineola on Long Island, the former science teacher at Herricks High School pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of attempting the unauthorized practice of medicine and a count of disorderly conduct.
On Friday, Judge Howard Sturim ordered her to fulfill 100 hours of community service over a year, while under interim probation. She was also ordered to go to therapy twice a week and to stay away from the teen. If Russo meets the community service requirement, prosecutors will vacate the misdemeanor charge.
U.S. State Dept Says Toll of COVID in China a Concern for the World
The United States hopes that China can address the current COVID-19 outbreak as the toll of the virus is a global concern due to the size of the Chinese economy, State Department spokesperson Ned Price said on Monday.
He added that anytime the virus is spreading it has the potential to mutate and pose a threat everywhere. “We’ve seen that over the course of many different permutations of this virus and certainly another reason why we are so focused on helping countries around the world address COVID,” he said.
FDA Expert Panel to Discuss the Future of COVID Vaccines
Food and Drug Administration advisers will hold a key meeting next month to discuss the state of the pandemic and whether COVID vaccines need to be modified again to better limit the fast-changing virus.
The big picture: Health experts say the Jan. 26 meeting, announced on Friday, will sketch out a long-term strategy that responds to new strains and shifting threats.
Details: The expert panel will evaluate the evolution of variants and the efficacy of current monovalent and bivalent vaccines to examine what the best course of action is for vaccinations moving forward.
What’s next: Following the advisers’ meeting, the FDA itself will then consider whether it’ll recommend adjusting current vaccine authorizations, and also consider what is the most efficient process to select strains to include in primary and booster shots. Don’t forget: Health officials have said they believe that COVID shots could potentially start following an annual schedule, similar to the flu.
25 Governors Urge Biden to End COVID Public Health Emergency
Twenty-five governors are urging President Joe Biden to end the COVID-19 public health emergency, which has remained in place despite a drop in COVID-19 metrics and the emergence of less virulent variants.
The governors say the emergency phase of the COVID-19 pandemic is and has been over for some time, noting that Biden himself said in September that “the pandemic is over.”
The public health emergency is harming states by enabling bloated Medicaid rolls, costing hundreds of millions of dollars, the governors said. Since the beginning of the pandemic, states have added 20 million people to the rolls — an increase of 30%. Until the emergency ends, the population covered by Medicaid will continue to grow, regardless of whether people are still eligible, the governors warned.
In Face of Tripledemic, CVS and Walgreens Limit Purchases of Kids’ Pain Meds
U.S. News & World Report reported:
As a tripledemic of the flu, COVID and RSV continues to spread across the United States, customers at two major pharmacy chains will now be limited as to how much children’s pain relievers and fever-reducing medications they can buy for their sick child.
Both CVS and Walgreens confirmed the limits Monday, CNN reported, though they’ve approached it in different ways.
Walgreens is only limiting children’s pain medications purchased online. The limit is six per transaction. Meanwhile, CVS is limiting both in-store and online purchases to two products per transaction.
Number of Children, Teens Killed Rose Sharply in Pandemic’s First Year: Study
The number of children and teenagers killed annually rose sharply during 2020, the first full year of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a new study.
The study from a group of eight researchers associated with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Defense Department and Georgia State University’s public health school found that the overall child homicide rate rose from 2.2 per 100,000 children in 2019 to 2.8 per 100,000 in 2020, which is a 27.7% increase.
The increase was most pronounced for boys, for which the rate rose from 2.9 per 100,000 in 2018 to 4.1 in 2020. That’s a 16.1% increase.
Children aged 11 to 15 were the age group with the largest increase, with the rate increasing from 1.3 in 2018 to 2.2 in 2020, a 26.9% jump. The rate for 16- and 17-year-olds rose 19%, from 6.6 to 10.0.
Rising Cases of Invasive Strep A in Kids Have Experts Concerned
U.S. News & World Report reported:
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is looking into a possible increase in invasive group A strep bacterial infections among children in the United States. A number of children’s hospitals in different parts of the country have reported seeing more dangerous strep A infections in recent weeks, leading federal officials to launch an investigation.
The agency noted the investigation for invasive group A strep on its website and warned that a national shortage of the liquid antibiotic amoxicillin could complicate efforts to treat the infections. However, experts say group A strep responds to many available antibiotics.
The U.S. cases follow a wave of invasive group A strep cases in the United Kingdom that have killed at least 15 children since mid-September, according to the U.K. Health Security Agency.
Children’s hospitals in Arizona, Colorado, Texas and Washington have reported higher-than-average numbers of cases this year compared to past years, NBC News reported. But it’s not happening in all parts of the United States.
How the Race for a COVID Vaccine Enriched Monkey Poachers and Endangered Macaques + More
How the Race for a COVID Vaccine Enriched Monkey Poachers and Endangered Macaques
The smuggling of monkeys caught in the wild is believed to have been going on for years due to the colossal demand for laboratory monkeys in the U.S. and the limited supply at breeding facilities at home and abroad.
The arrival of the pandemic and the race to find a COVID vaccine squeezed the market even further, experts say, setting off a mad scramble for the animals that fueled a spike in monkey poaching and contributed to the endangerment of the species most commonly used in drug studies — the long-tailed macaque.
“It’s gotten out of hand,” said Malene Friis Hansen, the director of the Long-tailed Macaque Project, a Denmark-based nonprofit group focused on conserving the primates. “The insane demand coming from the U.S. is driving the trade to an unsustainable level.”
The U.S. leads the world in the number of primates it imports for medical research. Between 2017 and May, more than 150,000 monkeys arrived in the U.S. to be used in experiments, according to figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
FDA Study Links Pfizer COVID Vaccine With Blood Clotting? Panic on Social Media After New Report
International Business Times reported:
Pharma giant Pfizer was trending on social media following an “FDA study” linking its COVID-19 vaccine with blood clotting in older individuals. The study titled ‘Surveillance of COVID-19 vaccine safety among elderly persons aged 65 years and older’ was published by the journal Vaccine, earlier this month.
The study was jointly conducted by the researchers from U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Acumen LLC, Department of Economics, Stanford University and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
The Epoch Times reported that a database of elderly persons in the United States found that pulmonary embolism, blood clotting in the lungs, met the initial threshold for a statistical signal and continued meeting the criteria after a more in-depth evaluation.
Three other observations including a lack of oxygen to the heart, a blood platelet disorder called immune thrombocytopenia and another type of clotting called intravascular coagulation, also raised red flags for the researchers, as per the outlet. The study included the subjects who received COVID-19 vaccine shots from Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson and Johnson.
‘I Don’t Trust It:’ Vaccine Hesitancy Lingers Even as China COVID Cases Surge
Headhunter Candice knows the COVID-19 infections engulfing Beijing and much of China will soon hit her home of Shenzhen city, but she would rather face it without a vaccine booster, saying she fears potential side effects more than the virus.
The 28-year-old took two doses of Sinovac’s CoronaVac last year, hoping it would make travel easier, but she has since grown more skeptical, citing stories from friends about health impacts, as well as similar health warnings on social media.
“I don’t trust it,” she said, speaking on the condition that only her first name be used. Candice said she has refused to participate in recent vaccination drives organized by her local community.
Candice is part of a group that demonstrates how vaccine hesitancy still runs deep in mainland China, academics say, which poses a growing headache for Beijing as it tries to persuade more to get vaccinated in the face of a spike in infections after the lifting of strict anti-COVID measures.
Israeli Government Mysteriously Loses Pfizer Vaccine Agreement That Promised to Share Population’s Data
The government of Israel has admitted in court that it has failed to locate its COVID-19 vaccine agreement with Pfizer despite an extensive search.
In 2020, Israel secured vaccines from Pfizer on a priority basis, promising to provide epidemiological data of its citizens in exchange. In a petition pending at the Jerusalem District Court, the Israeli Ministry of Health (MoH) claimed to have lost the agreement and also raised doubts about whether the agreement was even signed by the parties involved.
The agreement was made public in January last year. The ministry published the redacted agreement due to rising criticism about the terms involved in the data transfer. Many of the statements were hidden.
The agreement had also left spaces for signatures from the Health Ministry Director General as well as an executive from Pfizer whose name was blacked out. According to the agreement, MoH would provide data to Pfizer to the extent that such data does not reveal an individual’s identity.
CDC: Omicron Subvariants BQ, XBB Responsible for 3 Out of 4 Coronavirus Cases
U.S. News & World Report reported:
The Omicron subvariants that present “serious threats” to COVID-19 vaccines are growing in the U.S., according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
BQ.1.1, BQ.1 and XBB were responsible for more than 76% of coronavirus infections this week, according to CDC estimates — up from nearly 71% of cases last week.
The subvariants are raising concerns about a potential winter wave of COVID-19 as they are posing challenges to vaccines and monoclonal antibody treatments. A study published last week found that the subvariants are the “most resistant SARS-CoV-2 variants to date.”
No Link Between Sudden Hearing Loss and COVID Vaccination, Large Study Says — No Association Seen With SARS-CoV-2 Infection Either
Sudden sensorineural hearing loss (SSNHL) was not associated with receipt of COVID-19 vaccination, a register-based country-wide retrospective cohort study in Finland showed.
Among 5.5 million Finnish residents, the adjusted incidence rate ratios (aIRRs) of SSNHL with the Pfizer-BioNTech mRNA COVID vaccine’s three doses were 0.8 (95% CI 0.6-1.0), 0.9 (95% CI 0.6-1.2) and 1.0 (95% CI 0.7-1.4), respectively, compared with incidence before the pandemic, reported Petteri Hovi, MD, Ph.D., of the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare in Helsinki, and colleagues.
“Within the COVID-19 vaccinated population, the incidence of SSNHL did not show a temporal pattern associated with vaccination, and the incidences during the main risk periods were similar to the incidences before vaccination and those after the main risk periods,” they noted in JAMA Otolaryngology-Head & Neck Surgery.
Clinton-Backed Initiative Ships Pfizer COVID Drugs to Africa
The COVID Treatment Quick Start Consortium delivered its first shipment of Paxlovid, a COVID-19 treatment made by Pfizer Inc., to Africa on Monday with 1,000 courses of the drug arriving in Zambia.
The consortium, launched in September and backed by the Clinton Health Access Initiative and institutions including Duke University, aims to distribute 100,000 courses of the drug donated by Pfizer to poor nations, which have yet to receive therapeutic medicines to tackle the coronavirus.
America’s Historically Bad Flu Season May Be Peaking
The U.S. has been pummeled by respiratory illness, including a harsher flu season than we’ve seen in years. But new data indicates the outbreak may be peaking.
A succession of respiratory illnesses — the viruses that cause the common cold, RSV, strep, COVID and the flu — kicked off early and hit hard this season.
What we’re watching: Experts believe the nationwide trend may be close to peaking. But they predict the outbreak will morph into regional waves of illness into early spring that could stress health systems and collide with COVID.
Between the lines: This matches up to the experience in the clinical setting, at least at Children’s National, where a succession of respiratory illnesses hit earlier than usual, causing exponential jumps in cases, before finally starting to drop, Sarah Ash Combs, an emergency department physician at Children’s National Hospital, said.
More Than 7 Million Incorrect Diagnoses Made in U.S. Emergency Rooms Every Year + More
More Than 7 Million Incorrect Diagnoses Made in U.S. Emergency Rooms Every Year, Government Report Finds
A new study finds that nearly 6% of the estimated 130 million people who go to U.S. emergency rooms every year are misdiagnosed, which translates to about 1 in 18 patients getting the wrong diagnosis.
The report, published Thursday by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, reviewed nearly 300 studies published between January 2000 and September 2021.
The researchers estimate that 7.4 million misdiagnosis errors are made every year, 2.6 million people receive harm that could have been prevented and another 370,000 are permanently disabled or die because of the misdiagnosis. This equates to about 1,400 diagnostic errors every year per emergency room across the country.
The researchers noted that these rates are on par with what is also seen in primary care and hospital inpatient settings.
Spending More Time With Your Kids, Grandkids — and Their Germs — May Lower Risk of a Severe Outcome From COVID, Recent Studies Show
For parents, guardians and other people who interact with smaller children (and their germs) often, contracting an illness like the common cold could actually help strengthen your immune system against severe outcomes from COVID-19 infection. That’s according to two studies that were published in August and November of this year, which researched how exposure to younger kids and common colds may impact outcomes for adults after contracting COVID-19.
The study, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) in August, discovered an association between people who were exposed to young children and a lower risk of severe illness from COVID-19.
While adults with children had higher rates of COVID-19 infection than those without kids, adults without exposure to children had “significantly higher rates of COVID-19 hospitalization and hospitalization requiring ICU admission, compared to those with children aged 0–5,” the study says.
The November study, also published in PNAS, examined the relationship between recent exposure to common-cold coronaviruses and the likelihood of being infected by SARS-CoV-2, more commonly referred to as COVID-19. The findings showed that the chances of Veteran Affairs patients contracting COVID-19 decreased by 80% to 90% if they tested positive for any of the common coronaviruses between February 2020 and February 2021.
New York Times Falsely Reports Percentage of COVID Deaths
The New York Times falsely reported that about three out of every 100 people diagnosed with COVID-19 die, a falsehood the outlet later acknowledged. In a Dec. 14 story claiming COVID-19 can spread from dead people, reporter Apoorva Mandavilli wrote that “up to 70% of those infected with Ebola die, compared with about 3% of those diagnosed with COVID-19.”
There are two measures of fatalities from a disease: infection fatality ratio (IFR) and case fatality ratio (CFR). The first takes all infections and adds estimated ones drawn from serological testing and modeling. The second is drawn from only confirmed cases, so is always higher, due to how many COVID-19 cases are undiagnosed.
According to one recent estimate, the IFR ranges from 0.49% to 2.5% — but is much lower for those who aren’t elderly.
After The Epoch Times asked the New York Times for data to support Mandavilli’s claim, the paper updated the article. “Up to 70% of those infected with Ebola die. The figure for COVID is nowhere near as high — greater than 3% in the early days of the pandemic, and something closer to 1% or even less now,” the piece now states.
U.S. FDA Advisers to Weigh on Updating Initial COVID Vaccine Doses
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said on Friday it planned to hold a meeting of outside experts next month to discuss whether initial doses of COVID-19 vaccines need to be updated to combat circulating variants.
While updated booster doses from Pfizer (PFE.N) and Moderna (MRNA.O) are already approved for adults as well as children as young as five years, the FDA said it was important to weigh in on the composition of both initial and booster doses as new variants spread.
The independent advisers, who are scheduled to meet on Jan. 26, are also expected to weigh in on whether the timing or composition of booster doses needs to be adjusted.
New Poll Shows Why Some Adults Aren’t Getting the COVID Booster
About four in 10 adults say they’ve gotten the new bivalent booster or will get it as soon as they can, according to the latest Kaiser Family Foundation COVID-19 Vaccine Monitor. In the survey, 22% of adults said they have gotten the shot, while around 16% said they will soon. The data differ slightly from the numbers provided by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which shows that 15.5% of adults have gotten the bivalent booster dose so far.
For adults 65 and older, who are at the highest risk of COVID-19, the KFF survey found uptake is slightly higher — around 39%. And again, another 16% say they intend to get the booster soon. But this still leaves more than half of older adults without the shot and without any intention of getting one.
Among people who have already gotten the original COVID vaccine series but have not rolled up their sleeves for a booster, the most common response from adults (44%) was that they don’t think they need one.
More than a third, or 37%, said they didn’t think the benefits are worth it. Another third, or 36%, said they were too busy or hadn’t had time. About a quarter said they didn’t want to deal with bad side effects, while 17% said they were waiting to see if there would be a surge in their area first.
Study Claims Unvaccinated People More Likely to Be Reckless, Cause Traffic Accidents
A new study released this month by members of the Temerty Faculty of Medicine at Toronto University in Canada makes the bizarre claim that being unvaccinated is an indicator of psychological risk-taking and recklessness.
The authors, Donald A. Redelmeier, MD, Jonathan Wang, MMASc, and Deva Thiruchelvam, Msc, argue that data involving traffic accidents in which one or more people are admitted to the hospital for injuries shows a correlation between vaccination status and car wrecks.
The first question one might ask is why in the world anyone would engage in such a study in the first place. The notion is out of left field and requires a couple of initial assumptions — that unvaccinated people are a monolithic group that shares the same psychological motivators, and that those motivators are dangerous. Without this rather biased assumption, it’s unlikely that a group of doctors or scientists would dream up the study in the first place.
The authors of the study are all members of the University of Toronto Temerty Faculty and the Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre. This faculty and section of the university were funded by a $250 million grant from James C. Temerty and the Temerty Foundation in 2020; it was the single largest gift in Canadian history. The money was designated to various areas of the university, but a large portion went directly into COVID-19 research projects.
Report: Intelligence Agencies Didn’t Move Fast Enough to Collect COVID Data
The intelligence community was not prepared for the COVID-19 pandemic and did not move quickly enough to gather information about the spread of the virus, according to a report released Thursday by Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee.
The report looks at the intelligence community’s response to COVID-19, particularly in the early days of 2020. The intelligence agencies’ clandestine collectors largely focused on analyzing data about the virus that was already being discussed openly by public health officials and experts across the world, the report said, arguing that they moved too slowly to collect clandestine information.
And the intelligence community did not begin to provide that information to senior Trump administration officials until the end of January — weeks after the virus was already circulating across the world and after international health organizations had begun tracking the virus, the report said. The U.S. reported its first case on Jan. 18 and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence did not issue a directive for “enhanced community-wide collection” until Jan. 29, 2020.
Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee released a different report on Thursday focusing on how the intelligence community handled the question of COVID’s origins. It accused the intelligence community of failing to adequately address the question of whether there is a potential link between COVID-19 and China’s biological weapons efforts.
Long COVID Medical Costs Average $9,500 in First Six Months, as Patients Become ‘Health-System Wanderers’
Long COVID results in $9,500 of total average medical costs for workers and their employers in the six months following a diagnosis, according to a study by Nomi Health. Long COVID is a chronic illness that can carry potentially debilitating symptoms, which may last for months or years. It can impact anyone who has an initial COVID-19 infection, regardless of age or health.
Up to 30% of Americans who get COVID have developed long-haul symptoms; that means as many as 23 million Americans have been affected, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Long COVID patients are “health-system wanderers,” said Mark Newman, CEO and co-founder of Nomi Health. “They’re like nomads through the healthcare system, trying to figure out ‘What’s wrong with me?’”
Is COVID a Common Cold Yet?
Now, nearly three years into the crisis, the virus is more familiar, and its symptoms are too. Put three sick people in the same room this winter — one with COVID, another with a common cold and the third with the flu — and “it’s way harder to tell the difference,” Summer Chavez, an emergency physician at the University of Houston, told me.
Today’s most common COVID symptoms are mundane: sore throat, runny nose, congestion, sneezing, coughing and headache. And several of the wonkier ones that once hogged headlines have become rare. More people are weathering their infections with their taste and smell intact; many can no longer remember when they last considered the scourge of “COVID toes.”
Even fever, a former COVID classic, no longer cracks the top-20 list from the ZOE Health Study, a long-standing symptom-tracking project based in the United Kingdom, according to Tim Spector, an epidemiologist at King’s College London who heads the project. Longer, weirder, more serious illness still manifests, but for most people, SARS-CoV-2’s symptoms are getting “pretty close to other viruses’, and I think that’s reassuring,” Spector told me. “We are moving toward a cold-like illness.”
Tamiflu: Is the in-Demand Flu Treatment Safe to Take?
Like many other medications on the market, Tamiflu—a popular treatment for flu symptoms—is experiencing a shortage, much like Children’s Tylenol and amoxicillin. Doctors are prescribing the oral antiviral drug to help lessen the chances of complications from the flu, but some people are questioning its safety after learning about potential risks for kids and other side effects. Is Tamiflu safe? Medical experts say yes.
A study out of Vanderbilt University Medical Center is set to explore the neurological impact of the flu treatment. According to researchers, some flu patients have experienced “neuropsychiatric symptoms, such as behavior changes, hallucinations, and even attempted suicide,” says the VUMC Reporter. However, it’s unknown whether the symptoms are the result of the infection itself or Tamiflu.
Dr. Rachel Amdur, assistant professor of general internal medicine at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine, says that historically Japan has used Tamiflu in larger amounts than the United States and there have been reports of neuropsychiatric side effects, such as delirium, suicide and suicide attempts, with the medication, particularly in adolescents. But subsequent studies have not validated this concern.