[COVID-19 Virus] The Sinkies are fucked Thread.

[dredd]

Delta increases COVID-19 risks for pregnant women

Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine antibodies gone by 7 months for many

www.reuters.com

Oct 1 (Reuters) - The following is a summary of some recent studies on COVID-19. They include research that warrants further study to corroborate the findings and that have yet to be certified by peer review.

Delta variant increases risks for pregnant women

Compared to coronavirus cases earlier in the pandemic, infections with the Delta variant lead to worse outcomes for unvaccinated pregnant women, new data suggest. Doctors studied 1,515 pregnant women with COVID-19 who received care from a large public health system in Dallas from May 2020 through Sept. 4, 2021. Overall, 82 women - 81 of whom were unvaccinated - developed severe illness, including 10 who needed ventilators and two who died. The proportion of severe or critical cases among pregnant women was around 5% until early 2021, and were "largely nonexistent" in February and most of March 2021, the researchers said in a statement. In late summer, during the peak of the surge of the Delta variant, the proportion of pregnant COVID-19 patients requiring hospitalization jumped to 10% to 15%, they reported in the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology. Pregnant women face greater risks for complications with any type of severe respiratory infection, so these findings of the higher risk from the Delta variant further emphasize the need for them to get vaccinated for COVID-19, study leader Dr. Emily Adhikari of the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center said in a statement. On Wednesday, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention called for "urgent action" to increase COVID-19 vaccination among people who are pregnant, recently pregnant, including those who are breastfeeding, or who might become pregnant in the future, saying "the benefits of vaccination outweigh known or potential risks."

Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine antibodies disappear in many by 7 months

Six months after receiving the second dose of the two-shot vaccine from Pfizer Inc (PFE.N) and BioNTech SE , many recipients no longer have vaccine-induced antibodies that can immediately neutralize worrisome variants of the coronavirus, a new study suggests. Researchers analyzed blood samples from 46 healthy, mostly young or middle-aged adults after receipt of the two doses and again six months after the second dose. "Our study shows vaccination with the Pfizer-BioNtech vaccine induces high levels of neutralizing antibodies against the original vaccine strain, but these levels drop by nearly 10-fold by seven months" after the initial dose, Bali Pulendran of Stanford University and Mehul Suthar of Emory University said by email. In roughly half of all subjects, neutralizing antibodies that can block infection against coronavirus variants such as Delta, Beta, and Mu were undetectable at six months after the second dose, their team reported on Thursday on bioRxiv ahead of peer review. Neutralizing antibodies are not the immune system's only defense against the virus. Still, they "are critically important in protecting against SARS-CoV-2 infection," said Pulendran and Suthar. "These findings suggest that administering a booster dose at around 6 to 7 months following the initial immunization will likely enhance protection against SARS-CoV-2 and its variants."

Experimental Merck pill halves hospitalizations, deaths

Merck & Co's (MRK.N) experimental oral antiviral drug for COVID-19, molnupiravir, reduced by around 50% the chance of hospitalization or death for patients with mild or moderate infections who had risk factors for severe disease, according to interim clinical trial results announced by the company on Friday. A planned interim analysis of 775 patients in Merck's study found that 7.3% of those given molnupiravir twice a day for five days were either hospitalized or had died by 29 days after treatment, compared with 14.1% of placebo patients. There were no deaths among those given molnupiravir but eight in the placebo group. Due to the positive results, the Phase III trial is being stopped early at the recommendation of outside monitors. "An oral antiviral that can impact hospitalization risk to such a degree would be game changing," said Amesh Adalja, from Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, who was not involved in the study. Merck and partner Ridgeback Biotherapeutics plan to seek U.S. emergency use authorization for the pill as soon as possible, and to submit applications to regulatory agencies worldwide. If authorized, molnupiravir, which is designed to introduce errors into the genetic code of the virus, would be the first oral antiviral medication for COVID-19.

This Merck antiviral drug molnupiravir is very interesting and will be another weapon in the arsenal against COVID19 if approved.

Merck pill seen as 'huge advance,' raises hope of preventing COVID-19 deaths​

By Deena Beasley and Carl O'donnell

Merck pill raises hope of preventing COVID death
Oct 1 (Reuters) - An experimental antiviral pill developed by Merck & Co (MRK.N) could halve the chances of dying or being hospitalized for those most at risk of contracting severe COVID-19, according to data that experts hailed as a potential breakthrough in how the virus is treated.
If it gets authorization, molnupiravir, which is designed to introduce errors into the genetic code of the virus, would be the first oral antiviral medication for COVID-19.
Merck and partner Ridgeback Biotherapeutics said they plan to seek U.S. emergency use authorization for the pill as soon as possible and to make regulatory applications worldwide.
"An oral antiviral that can impact hospitalization risk to such a degree would be game changing," said Amesh Adalja, senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security.

Current treatment options include Gilead Sciences Inc's (GILD.O) infused antiviral remdesivir and generic steroid dexamethasone, both of which are generally only given once a patient has already been hospitalized.
"This is going to change the dialogue around how to manage COVID-19," Merck Chief Executive Robert Davis told Reuters.
Existing treatments are "cumbersome and logistically challenging to administer. A simple oral pill would be the opposite of that," Adalja added.
The results from the Phase III trial, which sent Merck shares up more than 9%, were so strong that the study is being stopped early at the recommendation of outside monitors.

Shares of Atea Pharmaceuticals Inc (AVIR.O), which is developing a similar COVID-19 treatment, were up more than 21% on the news.
Shares of COVID-19 vaccine makers Moderna Inc (MRNA.O) were off more than 10%, while Pfizer (PFE.N) was down less than 1%.
Jefferies analyst Michael Yee said investors believe "people will be less afraid of COVID and less inclined to get vaccines if there is a simple pill that can treat COVID."
Pfizer and Swiss drugmaker Roche Holding AG (ROG.S) are also racing to develop an easy-to-administer antiviral pill for COVID-19. For now, only antibody cocktails that have to be given intravenously are approved for non-hospitalized patients.

White House COVID-19 response coordinator Jeff Zients said on Friday that molnupiravir is "a potential additional tool... to protect people from the worst outcomes of COVID," but added that vaccination "remains far and away, our best tool against COVID-19."
A planned interim analysis of 775 patients in Merck's study looked at hospitalizations or deaths among people at risk for severe disease. It found that 7.3% of those given molnupiravir twice a day for five days were hospitalized and none had died by 29 days after treatment. That compared with a hospitalization rate of 14.1% for placebo patients. There were also eight deaths in the placebo group.

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An experimental COVID-19 treatment pill called molnupiravir being developed by Merck & Co Inc and Ridgeback Biotherapeutics LP, is seen in this undated handout photo released by Merck & Co Inc and obtained by Reuters May 17, 2021. Merck & Co Inc/Handout via REUTERS
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"Antiviral treatments that can be taken at home to keep people with COVID-19 out of the hospital are critically needed,” Wendy Holman, Ridgeback's CEO, said in a statement.
'A HUGE ADVANCE'

Scientists welcomed the potential new treatment to help prevent serious illness from the virus, which has killed almost 5 million people around the world, 700,000 in the United States.
“A safe, affordable, and effective oral antiviral would be a huge advance in the fight against COVID," said Peter Horby, a professor of emerging infectious diseases at the University of Oxford.
The study enrolled patients with laboratory-confirmed mild-to-moderate COVID-19, who had symptoms for no more than five days. All patients had at least one risk factor associated with poor disease outcome, such as obesity or older age.
Drugs in the same class as molnupiravir have been linked to birth defects in animal studies. Merck has said similar studies of molnupiravir – for longer and at higher doses than used in humans – indicate that the drug does not affect mammalian DNA.

Merck said viral sequencing done so far shows molnupiravir is effective against all variants of the coronavirus including the highly transmissible Delta, which has driven the recent worldwide surge in hospitalizations and deaths.
It said rates of adverse events were similar for both molnupiravir and placebo patients, but did not give details.
Merck has said data shows molnupiravir is not capable of inducing genetic changes in human cells, but men enrolled in its trials had to abstain from heterosexual intercourse or agree to use contraception. Women of child-bearing age in the study could be pregnant and also had to use birth control.
The U.S. drugmaker said it expects to produce 10 million courses of the treatment by the end of 2021.

The company has a U.S. government contract to supply 1.7 million courses of molnupiravir at a price of $700 per course.
Davis said Merck has similar agreements with other governments, and is in talks with more. Merck said it plans a tiered pricing approach based on country income criteria.
Merck has also agreed to license the drug to several India-based generic drugmakers, which would be able to supply the treatment to low- and middle-income countries.
Molnupiravir is also being studied in a Phase III trial for preventing infection in people exposed to the coronavirus.

Merck officials said it is unclear how long the FDA review will take, although Dean Li, head of Merck's research labs, said, "they are going to try to work with alacrity on this."

Reporting by Deena Beasley; Additional reporting by Josephine Mason, Editing by Lincoln Feast, Kirsten Donovan, Alexander Smith and Bill Berkrot

 

[kaninabuchaojibye]

Merck antiviral drug molnupiravir is very interesting and will be another weapon in the arsenal against COVID19 if approved.

hopefully...
pfizer moderna sinovac etc etc all gave lots of hopes when they were in experimental stage this time last year
one year later, now, they couldn't fight the superpower indian delta variant
one year from now, another variant crops up and render merck useless again? hopefully not....

 

[dredd]

interestingly, now is 98.2% not actually sick

For the majority of those infected below 70, COVID19 is a mild disease. The majority of the roughly 2% that are actually sick are seniors. So it stands to reason that with booster shots, this 98.2% will be further improved to 99%.

 

[zhihau]

For the majority of those infected below 70, COVID19 is a mild disease. The majority of the roughly 2% that are actually sick are seniors. So it stands to reason that with booster shots, this 98.2% will be further improved to 99%.

That’s because our ah nehs are of the younger lot, they can skew the percentages by a fair bit.

 

[dredd]

That’s because our ah nehs are of the younger lot, they can skew the percentages by a fair bit.

2909 infected seems like a lot and will get people's panties in a bunch. But looking closer, we can see almost a third of that number is dormitory infections so that reduces the local infection numbers significantly.

Anyhow, numbers mean nothing when 98.2% are mostly fine showing mild or no symptoms. Eventually. most of us will catch COVID. Just remain at home when you get it until you test negative and then move on. And what's more interesting is that with vaccination and with newly acquired natural immunity from being infected, you will have double immunity - the path towards herd immunity for all.

 

[dredd]

hopefully...
pfizer moderna sinovac etc etc all gave lots of hopes when they were in experimental stage this time last year
one year later, now, they couldn't fight the superpower indian delta variant
one year from now, another variant crops up and render merck useless again? hopefully not....

Maybe so, but it's unlikely new variants are going to mutate into something more deadly...

COVID-19 unlikely to mutate into deadly variant: vaccine creator​

Sarah Knapton
Sep 24, 2021 – 3.53pm
London

COVID-19 is unlikely to mutate into a much deadlier variant because there “aren’t many places for the virus to go”, the lead scientist behind the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine says.
Sarah Gilbert said viruses tended to become less virulent over time as they spread through a population that was becoming more immune.
Although Dame Sarah said some genetic drift was to be expected, COVID-19 would eventually become like other seasonal coronaviruses which cause the common cold and respiratory infections.

Covent Garden in London where Britons are returning to “COVID normal”. Getty

Speaking on a Royal Society of Medicine webinar about variants on Wednesday (Thursday AEST), Dame Sarah said: “The virus can’t completely mutate because its spike protein has to interact with the ACE2 receptor on the surface of the human cell, in order to get inside that cell.
“If it changes its spike protein so much that it can’t interact with that receptor, then it’s not going to be able to get inside the cell. So there aren’t very many places for the virus to go to have something that will evade immunity but still be a really infectious virus.”

She added: “We normally see that viruses become less virulent as they circulate more easily and there is no reason to think we will have a more virulent version of Sars-CoV-2.
“We tend to see slow genetic drift of the virus and there will be gradual immunity developing in the population as there is to all the other seasonal coronaviruses. There are four of them and they’ve been circulating for decades and we’re not even aware of them.

Sarah Gilbert: “There is no reason to think we will have a more virulent version.” AP
“So we already live with four different human coronaviruses that we don’t really ever think about very much and eventually Sars-CoV-2 will become one of those. The question [is] how long it’s going to take to get there and what measures we’re going to have to take to manage it in the meantime.”
So far, virus variants which looked like they might be more virulent and evade immunity have been outcompeted by the delta variant, which is more infectious.
Experts are still concerned about the beta and lambda variants, but neither has managed to get a strong foothold in Britain or Australia.
Sharon Peacock, executive director of the COVID-19 UK Genomics Consortium, which monitors variants for the British government, told the webinar: “It’s watch and wait, but delta is top of the list and other variants are not particularly concerning at the moment.
“It has been pretty quiet since delta emerged and it would be nice to think there won’t be any new variants of concern. If I was pushed to predict, I think there will be new variants emerging over time and I think there is still quite a lot of road to travel down with this virus.”
Professor Peacock said it was important to genetically sequence people who became ill after travelling to check that new variants were not being imported into Britain as they were the “canary in the coal mine”.
However, she said that vaccinating as many people as possible around the world was the best way to prevent the emergence of worrying mutations.

 

[Sideswipe]

densely populated country. cases rising sharply. officials sort of admitted that Covid19 is out of control. another lockdown will really stop the virus ?

 

[Leongsam]

densely populated country. cases rising sharply. officials sort of admitted that Covid19 is out of control. another lockdown will really stop the virus ?

Covid is not out of control because hardly anybody is actually sick.

 

[syed putra]

You can easily bring down covid figures by not testing.
In Malaysia, it seems they have a very high diabetic rate, real cause of fatalities, including among children. This was not noticed before because their gomen was out if touch with the ground.
The poor were feeding their babies with diluted condensed milk, especially among undocumented refugees of southern Philippines.

 

[laksaboy]

If it reaches six digits a day we shall achieve a fully endemic society. I expect the masks, beep-beep gantries, and ''safe management' cattle-herding to be no more.

 

[laksaboy]

You can easily bring down covid figures by not testing.
In Malaysia, it seems they have a very high diabetic rate, real cause of fatalities, including among children. This was not noticed before because their gomen was out if touch with the ground.
The poor were feeding their babies with diluted condensed milk, especially among undocumented refugees of southern Philippines.

Conversely, you can also easily bring up Covid figures by rigging the PCR testing. Oh yes it's true, it's damn true.

Bring up or bring down, it depends on what your objectives are.

 

[red amoeba]

Not testing is just sticking your head into sand. Majority of infected ain’t sick but a certain % does. If the base number is sufficiently large that % will be big. The next straw is if a child will die of Covid. This will cause widespread panic.

 

[millim6868]

yes keep on importing from ceca, now hv to pay the price ,they even allow their dependents comes in loads, even on wheel chair n pregnant, young n old all arrive together,fxxx the papigs,cannot wait stoll let them in ,now ask sinkies to get sick n live with it fxxx them ,hope their family members get covid first n hv a taste of chaotic at home, n those 61% hope they feel it also

 

[mahjongking]

Great news!

yes, should be 1,000,000 cases a day, in 5 days we will stop this nonsense
just concentrate on the death rate, age range and body weight of the dead

 

[zhihau]

this number will grow very fast very soon
their close proximity living environment will spur this number to a few thousands a day

I need to re-plot my graph on my Excel spreadsheet

 

[dredd]

Not testing is just sticking your head into sand. Majority of infected ain’t sick but a certain % does. If the base number is sufficiently large that % will be big. The next straw is if a child will die of Covid. This will cause widespread panic.

One of the key points for leading out of the COVID pandemic for Sinkees by SDP:

Stop testing asymptomatic vaccinated individuals outside of contact tracing. This will help ensure that resources are concentrated on those who need them most, such as the elderly and vulnerable who are actually infected.

 

[tobelightlight]

https://www.moh.gov.sg/

 

[bobby]

PM Lee says Singapore 'better prepared' for another virus after SARS outbreak​

SINGAPORE: Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said on Thursday (Jan 23 2020) that Singapore is "much better prepared" to deal with another virus outbreak since the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) epidemic in 2003.

“We have been preparing for this since SARS,” said Mr Lee, who was speaking at the sidelines of the World Economic Forum annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland.

Mr Lee was speaking before the first case of Wuhan virus in Singapore was confirmed.

The Wuhan virus is a new coronavirus that has sickened hundreds of people and killed at least 17.

“After SARS, we made a thorough review of what of the facilities we had – the infrastructure, hospitals, isolation wards, and the scientific testing and capabilities," said Mr Lee.

“I think we are much better prepared now,” Mr Lee said, also highlighting the new National Centre for Infectious Diseases, which opened in late 2018.

 

[tobelightlight]

“We have been preparing for this since SARS,” said Mr Lee, who was speaking at the sidelines of the World Economic Forum annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland.

1st Oct 2909 cases. really very well prepared, well prepared to have more cases.

 

[Leongsam]

Vaccines work which is why so few are dead or dying. However ask far as masks go I've said from day one that they are absolutely useless.