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COVID Patients Zero in Wuhan Identified, Boosting Lab Leak Theory
A report based on multiple anonymous sources inside the U.S. government says that researchers working inside the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) were the first to be infected with the virus that went on to trigger a pandemic and kill millions worldwide.
The report in Public cites “multiple U.S. government officials interviewed as part of a lengthy investigation” saying that Ben Hu, who led WIV’s gain-of-function research on coronaviruses, was among the “patients zero” who contracted the SARS-CoV-2 virus in November of 2019.
Sources told Public that Hu, Yu Ping, and Yan Zhu, all from WIV, are thought to be among the first infected with COVID-19. If confirmed, the report would seem to disprove the long-held theory that the virus was not accidentally leaked from the Wuhan coronavirus lab but instead emerged from a nearby wet market where exotic meats like pangolin are sold.
“When a source was asked how certain they were that these were the identities of the three WIV scientists who developed symptoms consistent with COVID-19 in the fall of 2019, we were told, “100%” it reads.
FDA Advisors Raise Doubts About Seasonal Updates to COVID Vaccines as With Flu Shots
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s independent panel of advisors raised doubts about the need to “periodically” update COVID vaccines, noting that it’s unclear if the virus is seasonal like the flu.
Advisors on Thursday unanimously voted that new jabs for the fall should be monovalent — meaning they are designed against one variant of COVID — and target one of the Omicron XBB strains. Those are now the dominant variants nationwide.
The panel’s concerns indicate there is still uncertainty around what the COVID pandemic will look like in the years ahead, even as cases and deaths decline nationwide. But several advisors cautioned against calling COVID seasonal like the flu. “It’s not clear to me that this is a seasonal virus yet,” said Henry Bernstein, a pediatrician at Cohen Children’s Medical Center.
It’s unclear how many Americans will roll up their sleeves to get updated shots this fall and winter. The uptake of the most recent bivalent boosters — which target the original COVID strain and Omicron BA.4 and BA.5 — has been sluggish.
Another Study Identifies High Rate of Severe Myocarditis Cases Post COVID Vax
A new South Korean nationwide study on vaccine-related myocarditis contains troubling implications on the severity of cardiac damage conferred by the mass experiment conducted on the population — young men in particular — without informed consent and a clear understanding of risk-reward ratios.
This new study published in the European Heart Journal is incredibly comprehensive. In South Korea, the Korean Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) established a reporting system to make it legally obligatory to report vaccine-adverse events such as myocarditis.
Among 44,276,704 South Koreans vaccinated, 1,533 cases of suspected myocarditis were identified under the KDCA. Of the 1,533 total cases, the KDCA’s “Expert Adjudication Committee on COVID-19 Vaccination Pericarditis/Myocarditis” confirmed 480 cases. The population-wide risk comes to 1 in 100,000.
For teenage boys ages 12–17, where the risk is most concentrated, the vaccine myocarditis incidence was predictably far higher at 1 in 18,900. This reported rate is far lower than other estimates from Hong Kong’s active surveillance system (1 in 2,680 after dose two) and Kaiser Permanente (1 in 2,650 after dose two) in the same age group. While a 1 in 18,000 risk is nontrivial on a population level, several reasons explain why South Korean researchers found a lower rate of myocarditis than various other American, European, and Asian study estimates.
Unsurprisingly, this study shows that mRNAs are far more dangerous (at least on the myocarditis front) than other COVID-19 vaccines.
Another COVID Booster Is Coming. But How Many Will Get It?
A new coronavirus booster shot is likely coming this fall. In a unanimous vote yesterday, the Food and Drug Administration’s expert advisers issued their recommendation: The next round of coronavirus shots should target the XBB variants, a branch of Omicron causing almost all of the nation’s recent COVID-19 infections.
That poses another challenge for the nation’s beleaguered public health officials, who’ll be tasked with encouraging vaccinations amid poor uptake of the most recent booster. Just 1 in 5 adults have received the bivalent shot, which became available last September.
The FDA still needs to make a decision on the vaccine’s formula, which is expected in the coming days. The agency isn’t required to follow the guidance of its advisers, though it often does.
Confidence in Science Fell in 2022 While Political Divides Persisted, Poll Shows
Confidence in the scientific community declined among U.S. adults in 2022, a major survey shows, driven by a partisan divide in views of both science and medicine that emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Overall, 39% of U.S. adults said they had “a great deal of confidence” in the scientific community, down from 48% in 2018 and 2021. That’s according to the General Social Survey, a long-running poll conducted by NORC at the University of Chicago that has monitored Americans’ opinions on key topics since 1972.
An additional 48% of adults in the latest survey reported “only some” confidence, while 13% reported “hardly any,” according to an analysis of the survey by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.
Overall, 34% of Americans reported a great deal of confidence in medicine in 2022, compared with 39% before the pandemic.
Mpox Vaccinations Extended in London After Spike in Cases
Health officials are extending vaccinations for mpox in London after recording a fresh spike in cases in the capital in recent weeks, mostly among unvaccinated people.
The national mpox outbreak vaccination program run by the U.K. Health Security Agency is due to close at the end of July, but shots will be made available in the capital beyond this date after the detection of 11 new cases, officials said.
The agency is monitoring new cases for signs of fresh clusters and working with NHS England on alternative options to provide mpox vaccinations across the country, particularly when local outbreaks occur.
