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California Bill to Punish Doctors for ‘False’ COVID Information Goes Into Effect
A bill that allows the state of California to punish doctors over ‘false information about COVID-19 vaccinations and treatments’ went into effect on Jan. 1. Under the new law (AB 2098) which took effect Jan.1, the state’s Medical Board would categorize dispensing information — such as the effectiveness of ivermectin, or the COVID-19 vaccine’s rapidly waning efficacy, as unprofessional conduct.
The law was challenged in court by two California doctors, who said that it would restrict their free speech in violation of the first amendment and that it was “vague” under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution.
However, on Dec. 28, Biden Nominee Judge Fred Slaughter refused to halt the law, ruling that the law trumps free speech claims and that it falls “within the longstanding tradition of regulations on the practice of medical treatments.”
Moderna Snaps up Japan’s OriCiro Genomics in mRNA Manufacturing Push
Moderna Inc. (MRNA.O) on Wednesday agreed to buy Japan-based OriCiro Genomics for $85 million to boost the U.S. drugmaker’s messenger RNA (mRNA) manufacturing capabilities.
The Japanese company is working on the development and commercialization of cell-free synthesis and amplification of a type of DNA molecule for use in mRNA manufacturing.
OriCiro’s technologies will support Moderna’s portfolio of therapeutics and vaccines, the companies said. Moderna’s mRNA technology has been used in developing COVID-19 vaccines.
Last month, an experimental cancer vaccine from Moderna based on the technology was shown to work against melanoma, a type of skin cancer.
COVID Could Alter the Immune System, But Your Gender Matters
U.S. News & World Report reported:
Researchers studying whether COVID-19 affects how the human immune system responds to subsequent viral threats found changes in men that differed from those in women. Researchers from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) analyzed the immune responses of healthy people who had received the flu vaccine. They then compared responses in those who had never had COVID with those who had mild cases and recovered.
They were surprised to find that men who had had mild COVID cases showed a stronger response to flu vaccines compared to either women with mild COVID infection or people of either sex who were never infected.
This means that the baseline immune status in previously infected men was altered in ways that changed the response to a different virus, said the authors, who included John Tsang, now a professor of immunobiology and biomedical engineering at Yale University in New Haven, Conn.
Researchers said these new findings may be linked to an observation made early in the pandemic — that men were much more likely to die from a runaway immune response than women after contracting SARS-CoV-2. Researchers said even mild cases of COVID may trigger stronger inflammatory responses in males than in females. This may result in more pronounced changes to the male immune system, even long after recovery, they said.
XBB.1.5 Omicron Subvariant Is the Most Transmissible Version of COVID yet, WHO Says
The XBB.1.5 Omicron subvariant that’s currently dominating the U.S. is the most contagious version of COVID-19 yet, but it doesn’t appear to make people sicker, according to the World Health Organization.
Maria Van Kerkhove, the WHO’s COVID-19 technical lead, said global health officials are worried about how quickly the subvariant is spreading in the northeastern U.S. The number of people infected with XBB.1.5 has been doubling in the U.S. about every two weeks, making it the most common variant circulating in the country.
“It is the most transmissible subvariant that has been detected yet,” Van Kerkhove told reporters during a press conference in Geneva on Wednesday. “The reason for this is the mutations that are within this subvariant of Omicron allowing this virus to adhere to the cell and replicate easily.”
It has been detected in 29 countries so far but it could be even more widespread, Van Kerkhove said. Tracking COVID variants has become difficult as genomic sequencing declines across the world, she said.
Weak Data as Booster for Comirnaty Close off Opportunity for Valneva’s COVID Vaccine
Valneva’s plans to establish its COVID-19 vaccine as a booster to Pfizer and BioNTech’s Comirnaty have taken a blow, with a clinical trial of the shot eliciting “only a marginally increased neutralizing antibody response.”
France’s Valneva has continued to try to carve out a space for VLA2001, a vaccine made of inactivated whole virus particles of SARS-CoV-2, despite seeing other companies establish dominant positions in the COVID-19 market. The bid for relevance led the company to run two trials of VLA2001 as a heterologous booster, one in recipients of Comirnaty and another in people primed with AstraZeneca’s Vaxzevria.
Valneva’s data drop comes around one year after an independent trial, the U.K.’s COV-Boost, generated evidence that VLA2001 is a lackluster booster in people primed with Pfizer and BioNTech’s Comirnaty. In COV-Boost, VLA2001 was the only one of the seven tested vaccines to fail to meet the preestablished minimum clinically important difference in antibody levels when used to boost Comirnaty.
Omicron Subvariants BA.5.2 and BF.7 Driving China’s Latest COVID Outbreak — WHO
China’s recent COVID-19 outbreak is predominantly led by the Omicron subvariants BA.5.2 and BF.7, which together account for 97.5% of all local infections, the World Health Organization said on Wednesday.
The data was based on an analysis of more than 2,000 genomes by the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the WHO said.
Oral Antiviral Matches Paxlovid in High-Risk COVID — Remdesivir Analogue Demonstrates Non-Inferiority, Good Safety in Chinese Randomized Trial
An oral remdesivir analogue (VV116) was just as good as nirmatrelvir-ritonavir (Paxlovid) for the treatment of mild-to-moderate COVID-19 in adults at risk for severe disease, and may be safer, results of a phase III trial from China suggested.
Sustained clinical recovery of COVID-19 symptoms with a 5-day course of VV116 proved non-inferior to nirmatrelvir-ritonavir, with patients recovering at a median 4 days versus 5 days, respectively, from the start of treatment (HR 1.17, 95% CI 1.02-1.36), according to Ren Zhao, MD, Ph.D., of Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, and colleagues.
Among more than 800 randomized patients, none progressed to severe COVID-19 or died during the study, which was conducted during a period of Omicron B.1.1.529 predominance.
Although remdesivir (Veklury) is a recommended option for individuals with high-risk COVID, it needs to be administered intravenously over the course of 3 days, “which limits its widespread use during the pandemic,” the researchers explained in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Nepal to Receive 1.5 Million Doses of Pfizer COVID Vaccine
Nepal is all set to receive 1.5 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines (for booster doses) from the Global Alliance for Vaccine and Immunization (GAVI) next month.
According to the government, the GAVI has confirmed the dispense of such a quantity of vaccine to Nepal on Feb. 2. The vaccine will be arriving in the Himalayan Nation in the first week of February.
Belgium Declares Flu Epidemic
Belgium’s national public health institute Sciensano officially declared a flu epidemic Wednesday, with cases surging to similar levels as COVID-19.
In addition to the influenza virus, the bronchiolitis virus, coronavirus and other respiratory viruses that can cause the same symptoms are currently circulating, the institute added.
The healthcare sector is already struggling due to the high cases, but experts predict the worst could be yet to come. The peak is expected in three or four weeks, according to Van Gucht, who added that “it is always possible to get a flu shot.”
Other countries like Germany and Slovakia had already declared an epidemic and more countries are expected to do so.
