The COVID-2019 Thread

[katie23]

^Cebu Pacific budget airline here in PI is advocating for it. It may be the future of air travel...

Link to 7 Dec article:
'COVID passport' will be essential when international travel reopens: Cebu Pacific boss | ABS-CBN News

[jabir]

What a surprise, I wonder if this new travel policy will spread as fast as the virus did.

[katie23]

More about the possibility of covid passports, from Euronews

Do we need coronavirus 'vaccine passports' to get Europe moving again? Euronews asks the experts

Edit:

The Dept of Tourism (DOT) in PI is also in favor of covid passports.

DOT backs proposed ‘COVID-19 passport,’ says its vital to reviving int’l air travel

[panama hat]

Meanwhile the gutless, pandering-wonder PM Jacinda Ardern has knocked back the reciprocity of travel between most of Oz and NZ . . . as well as stating that she doesn't want to open borders with anyone really before mid next year. Screw that for a laugh. She has outplayed her 'aroha/love' card by wanting to show how much she cares . . . but is quite happy to allow the speaker of the house, of her own party, to have called a private citizen a rapist . . . and quite happily wants the taxpayer to pay for the $330.000+ legal fees and reparations - after having changed the guidelines so he doesn't have to pay.

Ardern really is vile.

Anyway, covid-19

[OhOh]

Hopefully as soon as enough people a vaccinated

And:

1. The vaccinated's death rates, post vaccination, are deemed acceptable.
2. A consensus on an acceptable testing procedure is adopted.

added

3. Any time to allow for the virus to be defeated.

[reddog]

Ardern really is vile.

Panama Hat,never trust someone who can eat an apple through a picket fence.

[HermantheGerman]

AstraZeneca to work on Covid vaccine combinations with Russia’s Sputnik V developers
PUBLISHED FRI, DEC 11 2020

After this GREAT news I wonder why??

Shares of AstraZeneca were little changed for the session on Friday.

With the Sputnik V vaccine, Vladimir Putin wanted to defeat the coronavirus. But there are too few doses - and hardly anyone in Russia wants to be vaccinated with them.

Let's face it, would ANYBODY vaccinate himself by something "Made in Russia"?

Do I look like a rusky guniea pig?

[panama hat]

Panama Hat,never trust someone who can eat an apple through a picket fence.

Let's face it, would ANYBODY vaccinate himself by something "Made in Russia"?

Yea, I can't see even Loondyke flying back to Mother Russia to prove his allegiance to the thug Putin

[harrybarracuda]

What a surprise, I wonder if this new travel policy will spread as fast as the virus did.

Face it, is it a sensible step, and one they should be talking about already, because if it needs any kind of standardised, durable document like a passport, someone has to ramp up the infrastructure and printing to enable it.

[misskit]

Russia Recorded Almost 50K Excess Deaths in October – Deadliest Month in Decade


Russia recorded more than 47,000 excess deaths in October — the sharpest monthly rise in fatalities since the start of the coronavirus pandemic — according to official statistics published Thursday.


Russia’s state statistics agency (Rosstat) said Russia recorded more than 205,000 total fatalities in October — 30% more than during the same month last year.


It was the single most deadly month in Russia for more than a decade — surpassing the previous high set in August 2010, when devastating wildfires swept across much of the country, killing tens of thousands.


MORE Russia Recorded Almost 50K Excess Deaths in October – Deadliest Month in Decade - The Moscow Times

[misskit]

The Darkest Hour for America is Still to Come, Experts Say

If Americans do not change their behavior quickly, experts warn, the weeks and months ahead will be filled with more death and despair, packed hospitals and unemployment lines.

MORE The darkest hour for America is still to come, experts say. What we do next is key.

[misskit]

Dogs trained to detect people infected with COVID-19 – by sniffing their armpits


MAISONS-ALFORT, France — While a vaccine for the coronavirus will help stop the pandemic’s spread, finding everyone who may be carrying the virus is still an issue. Luckily, man’s best friend is now on the case. Researchers in France are helping to specially train dogs to detect people infected with COVID-19 — by sniffing their armpits.


A new study that has seen pilot programs spring up around the world has discovered that dogs can sniff out coronavirus in the sweat of humans. Thanks to their famously acute sense of smell, dogs have been rooting out drugs, explosives, and even successfully pick up diseases like cancer for years.

The French scientists are now showing how our furry friends can also help save lives during the pandemic by spotting virus clues. An early experiment suggested canines could be between 75 and 100 percent effective at detecting the disease with their noses.

The technique has already been piloted in several countries including the UEA, Lebanon, Finland, Australia, and elsewhere. Travelers may already have seen the specially trained dogs at some airports, but researchers are still trying to prove without a doubt that dogs can pick up the scent before the method is fully adopted.


The team behind the study hope their findings will mean dogs could help with COVID aid in parts of the world without the infrastructure for expensive mass testing programs. The loveable animals could be used anywhere however, with the hope that invasive nasal swabs could be replaced by a simple sweat sample taken from under the armpit for a dog to sniff.


Mass testing alternative?


Professor Dominique Grandjean, from the National Veterinary School of Alfort in France, says the dogs could check a large number of people in a short period of time.


“The results are good and I’m happy, really happy,” Grandjean says in a statement, per SWNS. “It is a success technically and scientifically and it’s surprising because we didn’t know what we were going to have as results.”

“We have been validated by the World Health Organization and they have given us a bit of money which is good. “Probably the country which is the most advanced now is the UAE, where they have dogs in three international airports. They are deploying some mobile units to go to the villages and to the people that might be more exposed to the virus,” the professor explains.



“For us here the idea was, of course, the airports but I can imagine a small city having a couple of dogs and just saying to the population ‘you can be tested whenever you want.’ You just come and put a swab under your armpit and give that to the dog and he will tell you yes or no. The dogs would be able to do that very quickly on a large number of people.”


Ending the pandemic one sniff at a time


Grandjean adds that dogs could also be used where people are reluctant to have uncomfortable nasal swab tests. During the study, which started in March, the researchers recruited six dogs previously trained to sniff out bombs, colon cancer, or used in search-and-rescue missions and re-trained to detect COVID-19.


They then collected sweat samples from 177 people (95 with COVID-19 and 82 without) and then placed the samples inside cones for the dogs to sniff. In trials, the dogs successfully picked out the infected sweat when examining a line-up of mock and negative samples.


Although the published study is just a “proof of concept” and cannot be taken as absolute proof, Prof. Grandjean and his team have now carried out further studies to validate their results and have more planned in 2021. They have also issued a “practical guide” to other academics to help others in their research and are building up a set of “international training standards” for dogs.


“We have been working with lots of countries. I think we have 20 countries working for us. It’s amazing, really amazing,” Prof. Grandjean concludes.


The study was published in the online journal PLOS ONE.

Dogs trained to detect people infected with COVID-19 - by sniffing their armpits - Study Finds





Those poor dogs. Sniffing armpits is bad enough but having to sniff French armpits is animal cruelty!

[PlanK]

Face it, is it a sensible step, and one they should be talking about already, because if it needs any kind of standardised, durable document like a passport, someone has to ramp up the infrastructure and printing to enable it.

Simple solution: just put a chip in the vaccine.
No one could complain about that, right? A bet ole Billy Gates could whip one up in no time!

[Buckaroo Banzai]

And:

1. The vaccinated's death rates, post vaccination, are deemed acceptable.
2. A consensus on an acceptable testing procedure is adopted.

added

3. Any time to allow for the virus to be defeated.

Regardless of the death rates or infection rates, if a person is vaccinated and has no or very little chance of being infected or infecting anyone else, why should such person need to be quarantined?
Can you think of a good reason other than to make money for the hotels, which IMO it would be counterproductive to the aggregate economy because any money made from quarantine would be far outweighed by the revenue lost from depressed tourism.

PS:"The digital Travel Pass will display a record of an individual’s test results, proof of inoculation (as vaccines become available) and link to an electronic copy of the user’s passport for identity verification. For users, it will also serve as a resource that lists various rules for national entry and nearby lab locations that meet their destination’s testing and/or vaccination requirements, Bloomberg reported."

IATA Announces Creation of Digital COVID-19 Travel Pass | TravelPulse

Hopefully Thailand will participate.

[jabir]

Covid travel passes will be available in Khoa San within a month of issue, and at your local ma and pa shortly thereafter.

[PAG]

I, as I'm sure many others on here, have operated in countries for which entry to requires an up to date Yellow Fever Certificate. In future, any responsible country is going to require proof of vaccination type and validity based on whatever is the globally accepted minimum.

As an aside. A couple of interesting reads in this mornings Sunday Times. It's a PITA doing cut and paste from such as these, with font colour and size necessary though I'll do my best.


Astra Zeneca buys US rare diseases rival Alexion for $39bn


Drugs giant defies Brexit uncertainty with surprise strike


Britain’s biggest maker of pharmaceuticals has swooped on an American rival in a daring move on the eve of Brexit.

Astra Zeneca, the FTSE 100 drug-maker playing a central role in the fight against Covid-19, has agreed to buy Alexion Pharmaceuticals for $39bn (£28.9bn). The cash-and-shares deal will cement the Anglo-Swedish giant’s position in immunology and give it a dedicated rare disease business based in Boston, Massachusetts.

The takeover caps a year in which Astra chief executive Pascal Soriot has won plaudits for joining forces with Oxford University to develop a vaccine to fight the coronavirus, although they were criticised for the way the results were announced. The jab, which has been through phase 3 trials, could be approved for use in the UK by the end of the year.

The Alexion purchase follows speculation that Astra was hunting for a deal, with reports that it considered a merger with American rival Gilead in the summer. It is the latest in a series of bold decisions by Soriot, 61, who rebuffed a £55-a-share offer from America’s Pfizer in 2014 to pursue a high-stakes turnaround.

When Soriot joined eight years ago, Astra was battling to replace sales of its top-selling drugs, which were facing steep “patent cliffs”, leaving them open to competition from cheaper copycats.

Soriot invested heavily in R&D and in 2018, Astra returned to growth for the first time since 2009. Star performers include a new cancer medication, Tagrisso. Since Soriot rebuffed Pfizer, the shares have risen by 87%, closing on Friday at £81.60, valuing Astra at £107.1bn. It reported third-quarter sales of $6.6bn, an increase of 3% on last year.

Soriot said the deal was a “tremendous opportunity” for Astra to bolster its presence in immunology and venture into rare diseases properly.

“It’s also an acceleration of our financial profile,” he added. “We have been on a journey of rebuilding our pipeline over a number of years. It’s an important step in the history of the company.”

Alexion’s top-selling drug is Soliris, a treatment for a rare, life-threatening disease that destroys red blood cells. The company, led by Belgian Ludwig Hantson, reported sales of $5bn last year.

Alexion shareholders will own about 15% of the combined company. Astra said that both boards had approved the deal unanimously. It is expected to close in the third quarter of next year.


and this one re manufacturing:

Behind the scenes of Britain’s coronavirus vaccine factory

Astra Zeneca’s Covid drug started in Oxford and is being finished in north Wales

At a nondescript warehouse on an industrial site in north Wales, the final stage in a process that could transform Britain’s prospects next year is taking place. Millions of doses of a vaccine for Covid-19 are running off a production line. Vials are being filled with the precious fluid and boxed up for distribution.

This factory, owned by the Indian drug-maker Wockhardt — whose name was chosen to sound like “work hard” — is the final step of a process that began 10 months ago in an Oxford laboratory. When Boris Johnson visited the plant last month, he said it could provide “salvation for humanity”. The government has reserved one of the production lines for 18 months, enabling it to guarantee a supply of vaccine to fight the virus.

Until now, the Wrexham site has been a little-known outpost of the Indian giant, owned by pharmaceutical tycoon Dr Habil Khorakiwala. This year, it has become a vital piece of the coronavirus vaccine puzzle.


The vaccine factory is housed in a nondescript industrial estate

Speaking after Johnson’s visit, Khorakiwala, 78, said the government contract reflected Wockhardt’s “ongoing commitment to fight against such a pandemic of global human importance”, boasting that the business had the capacity to produce one billion doses.

This is Britain’s contribution to the global immunisation effort. In less than a year, the Oxford vaccine has been pushed out of the lab and into clinical trials. If approved, it will soon be shipped to GP practices and mass vaccination centres. Unlike the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine, which has already been approved and costs £15 a dose, the Oxford version costs about £3. It is also much easier to store and transport — the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine must be kept at an extremely cold temperature. Ministers have reserved 100 million doses for the UK.


The FTSE 100 drugs-maker Astra Zeneca, which developed the vaccine with Oxford University, plans to produce two billion doses — ensuring it can be rolled out across the developing world.

It is an extraordinary feat. Before 2020, the UK did not have the capacity to produce enough jabs for a pandemic. This year, hundreds of millions of pounds has been invested in vaccine manufacturing sites to lay the groundwork for the end-to-end development of a vaccine for Covid-19. Wockhardt and its partners — which include manufacturers Oxford Biomedica and Cobra Biologics — have joined Astra’s vaccine consortium.

The scientific achievement has been somewhat overshadowed by criticism of how the results of the Oxford trial were communicated. While Pfizer’s vaccine was 95% effective, the Oxford one was 62% or 90%, depending on whether the first of two doses was a full or half shot. Despite the lack of clarity, the vaccine looks set to be approved. Last week, researchers confirmed in the Lancet that it was safe and effective. Data from a phase-three trial has been submitted to the UK’s medicines regulator, the MHRA.

Dr Sarah Gilbert, who led the development of the vaccine, summed up its advantage on Radio 4’s Today: “We know it can be manufactured in large quantities and at low price.”

While the Oxford scientists won plaudits for their work, manufacturers have been quietly beavering away in the background. Experts have been focused on the scale of the challenge in making the 100 million doses bought by the government in this country, given the dearth of vaccine-making plants. In April, Dr Michael Head, senior research fellow in global health at Southampton University, said it was “unprecedented”. “We can only watch on, and hope the Oxford optimism comes to fruition,” he said at the time.

Usually, when a big drug-maker increases manufacturing in line with progress through clinical trials, a supply chain is already in place. This time, none existed. Also, Astra, Pfizer and other rivals usually wait until drugs have made their way through trials before ramping up production. This time, there simply wasn’t time for that.

In a video discussing the challenge, Per Alfredsson, senior vice-president at Astra, said: “The process to develop and commercially manufacture a vaccine usually takes years ... We are rising to meet the challenge of production at scale, and at pace, by building a network of collaborations around the world.”

The BioIndustry Association, the trade body, had formed a taskforce to try to galvanise the manufacturing effort and sent out a plea to the industry. At the same time, the government announced a £93m investment to open the UK’s first dedicated centre for manufacturing vaccines at the Harwell science campus in Oxfordshire. However, the centre will not be ready until the summer — too late for the early stages of this pandemic. Dr Matthew Duchars, chief executive of the Vaccines Manufacturing and Innovation Centre, hopes it will eventually be able to make 200 million doses a year in the event of a future pandemic.

Realising that the Harwell site would not come online in time, Duchars decided instead to help Oxford Biomedica, a cell and gene therapy specialist that had joined forces with Astra’s consortium. He sent the firm two bioreactors — machines that can increase vaccine-making capacity. “The whole world was caught on the back foot with Covid,” said Duchars. “Nobody could produce a vaccine until now, and we are right at the forefront of that. We’re one of the first countries to produce a vaccine.”

Until the state’s vaccine manufacturing plant at Harwell is ready, the government is relying on a group of private companies that have joined forces to create a complex supply chain. Among them is Oxford Biomedica, which recently moved into the offices vacated by the disgraced fund manager Neil Woodford. Three of its manufacturing suites have been reserved by Astra for 18 months.

The process begins in laboratories at Astra, which prepare small groups of cells — known as cell banks — to send out to its manufacturing partners. Once Oxford Biomedica receives the cells, its scientists work round the clock to grow them over several weeks. They are then moved from small flasks into the 1,000-litre bioreactors. The batches require constant monitoring. “I always say cells don’t sleep,” said Oxford Biomedica chief executive John Dawson.

The manufacturing process is tightly guarded. Scientists must wear personal protective equipment at all times and any visitors must produce a negative Covid test before entry — contamination could disrupt the supply of millions of doses. Oxford Biomedica and its partners are also on high alert for cyber-attacks.

Once the vaccine is ready, the substance is concentrated, filtered and poured into trays before being frozen. The vaccine leaves Oxford Biomedica’s plant at a temperature of -80C and is driven to Wockhardt. There, it is combined with other liquids — known as buffers — to achieve the final formulation, and poured into multidose vials. These are then handed over to Public Health England for distribution.

“You can see why the government strategy has been built around this,” said Dawson, who sends off batches to Wockhardt most weeks. “It [the finished vaccine] can be shipped at room temperature, which makes it far more usable.”

Such is the demand for the Oxford vaccine that Astra has struck manufacturing partnerships across the world. In the UK, Oxford Biomedica is being supported by Cobra Biologics, based at Keele University near Crewe. Its chief executive, Peter Coleman, has hired 35 new staff to help with the increased demand, taking his workforce to 150.

In future, it is hoped that the UK will be able to develop its own vaccines at Harwell without relying on manufacturers such as Cobra or Oxford Biomedica. This summer, the government awarded £100m to the Cell and Gene Catapult for a centre to scale up Covid-19 vaccine and gene therapy manufacturing, in addition to the Harwell investment. Eventually this site, in Braintree, Essex, will have the capacity to produce millions of doses a month. The Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy said it would have two permanent manufacturing sites with the capability to manufacture 70 million doses within six months.

“It’s not just about this particular pandemic; it’s also about getting ready in case there is another one,” said Matthew Durdy, chief executive of the Cell and Gene Catapult. Until then, Oxford Biomedica, Cobra and Wockhardt will stay busy. This month, trucks will repeatedly pull up outside Wockhardt’s plant next to a roundabout on an industrial estate. The finished vaccines, which are being stored in a secret location, are ready.




Habil Khorakiwala, founder and chairman of Wockhardt
ANIRUDDHA CHOWDHURY

Boy from Bombay who shook up the drugs industry

The factory in Wrexham is owned by CP Pharmaceuticals, a subsidiary of Indian drugs giant Wockhardt.

In the UK, Wockhardt is a leading manufacturer of generic medicines, which are not patented. Typically, a generic product takes less time to develop and costs less than its branded equivalent. Earlier this year, however, Wockhardt turned over its expertise — and its factory and 400 staff in north Wales — to filling and finishing vials of the Astra Zeneca/Oxford University Covid-19 vaccine. When the deal was announced in August, the founder and chairman, Habil Khorakiwala, said he was “proud” to be collaborating with the UK. “The arrangement brings a huge sense of purpose and pride. It upholds our ongoing commitment to fight against such a pandemic of global human importance,” he said.

For his son, Murtaza, 48, the managing director of Wockhardt, it was a chance to showcase the company’s “global strength”. He declared: “With four decades of expertise and experience behind us, we are able to quickly scale to manufacture and assist in mitigating the worldwide impact of Covid-19.”

Over years, Habil, now 78, has built Wockhardt into a generics giant employing 7,000 people, with 73% of its sales coming from outside India.
His father, Fakhruddin, owned a group of department stores and served as sheriff of Mumbai. After going to America to study at Purdue University in Indiana and Harvard Business School, Habil returned to India to work in what was then the small pharma division of his father’s empire. He chose the name Wockhardt for the burgeoning business because he thought it sounded like “work hard” and seemed quaintly foreign.

In a memoir, Odyssey of Courage, the father of three describes himself as a “boy from Bombay” — a shop owner’s son who went on to lead a global pharmaceuticals company.

In an interview in 2018, Khorakiwala boasted that 20 years earlier, his company was not “even in existence in the US”. Today, almost a third of the world’s prescription drugs come from Indian manufacturers such as Wockhardt. Explaining the rapid growth, he said that Indians were “high risk-takers”.

“We have to deal with a lot of difficulties, as a nation, and as individuals within the country,” said Khorakiwala, whereas westerners were “not as hungry. They want to maintain the status quo. De-risking is what they want to do in life.”

[OhOh]

if a person is vaccinated and has no or very little chance of being infected or infecting anyone else, why should such person need to be quarantined

I've read the vaccination takes time to become effective and presumable able to protect the vaccinated person and anyone they are in contact with.

Or is there not to be any testing, with an internationally agreed/available test, of the person, post vaccination?

To ensure the person is 100% protected and proven to be a 100 % no risk of infecting others person?

[HuangLao]

I've read the vaccination takes time to become effective and presumable able to protect the vaccinated person and anyone they are in contact with.

Or is there not to be any testing, with an internationally agreed/available test, of the person, post vaccination?

To ensure the person is 100% protected and proven to be a 100 % no risk of infecting others person?

It's my understanding that these particular vaccines were universally developed without a hint of the virus included - historically, vaccines are created as a hybrid prophylactic containing a form of the virus itself.
In this case, COVID vaccines were brilliantly developed through protein antibody enzymes that increase immunity. COVID is different...so they had to approach the strain in a different manner.
It would be impossible to be contagious after receiving the course of vaccine, as there's no viral duplication to be modeled from.

[OhOh]

protein antibody enzymes that increase immunity

Upon injection or some undisclosed, time

after receiving the course of vaccine

and rigidly following the vaccine makers post vaccination "advice"?

"Monitoring for adverse events will be necessary and important."

SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 Mass Vaccination Planning Guide | IDPH

"All providers must include in their plans, procedures for reporting clinically important adverse events. Adverse events also will be monitored through Electronic Health Records (EHR) and claims-based systems such as Vaccine Safety Datalink."

SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 Mass Vaccination Planning Guide | IDPH

No Alcohol for 2 Months, Russia Tells Coronavirus Vaccine Recipients

No Alcohol for 2 Months, Russia Tells Coronavirus Vaccine Recipients - The Moscow Times

[panama hat]

No Alcohol for 2 Months, Russia Tells Coronavirus Vaccine Recipients

Russia will have close to zero uptake

[harrybarracuda]

Dear Jeff and HooHoo,

There are antibody tests. I've had one.

Since you're both a bit thick, here's description you might understand.

What Is an Antibody Test?

An antibody test is a screening for things called antibodies in your blood.

[misskit]

Fauci fanboys might like this SNL skit from last night.

[Troy]

Germany is struggling to keep Covid under control and Bavaria is getting hit pretty hard. We were expecting a lockdown over the Christmas period but it appears to be going ahead a few days earlier than expected with Wednesday being reported and lasting until 10 January. I'm not sure yet if that means forced home office from Wednesday onwards as well.

[panama hat]

I'm not sure yet if that means forced home office from Wednesday onwards as well.

My brother in Berlin says probably as of Tuesday or Wednesday. Good.

[David48atTD]

Covid-19 Anthems ...