Fear of losing loved ones motivates people to get vaccine

TB Team
-
0
Fear of losing loved ones motivates people to get vaccine

To motivate more people to mask up and get vaccinated, emphasizing the benefits of being a protector for the family and loved ones is more effective to overcome their resistance, shows new research.

While many people have listened to messages about wearing a mask and following social distancing guidelines to limit the spread of COVID-19, resistance remains.

A new study from the University of Michigan has found that appealing to people’s concerns for their loved ones can encourage people to get the vaccine.

“People who respond negatively to being ‘told’ what to do are much less likely – by more than 50 percent – to routinely wear a mask. However, at the same time, concern for others increases mask-wearing, especially among those who report greater negativity,” said study author Lawrence An, associate professor of general medicine at Michigan Medicine.

In a recent survey, people who said social distancing and COVID-safety guidelines violated their personal freedoms responded more positively to these ideas when they felt a loved one might be at risk of severe illness.

As the coronavirus pandemic continues to ravage the world, messaging focused on shaming or pressuring people to wear a mask or avoid crowds are backfiring.

An and colleagues surveyed 1,074 people across the US about their attitudes toward the coronavirus.

They discovered two distinct sets of attitudes toward social distancing: Positive beliefs that largely mirror public health messaging and negative beliefs, including the idea that social distancing violates individual rights and freedoms.

Concern about a loved one’s risk of severe COVID-19 infection was tied to both higher positive attitudes and lower negative attitudes toward social distancing.

“When people think about what protective behaviors to follow, negative beliefs — the perception of external control — override positive beliefs. This means that simply repeating that people should follow public health guidelines is unlikely to be effective,” explained study author Kenneth Resnicow in a paper published in the journal Patient Education and Counseling.

The data showed that when people consider being a protector for others, they approach risk differently.

“They are less likely to let their personal beliefs and politics discourage them from practicing COVID protection. Emphasizing the act of protecting others may help people who would otherwise be reluctant to practice COVID protection to feel independent and strong, rather than compliant or obedient,” Resnicow emphasized.

Protectors can take responsibility for monitoring the at-risk person’s COVID exposure and protecting them from the disease by limiting the person’s exposure to others.

This includes doing the shopping, maintaining cleaning protocols and PPE, and providing safe transportation.

Google offers free weekly Covid tests to all US employees

TB Team
-
0
Google offers free weekly Covid tests to all US employees

Google is offering free weekly Covid-19 tests to 90,000 employees in the US.

According to a report in the Wall Street Journal, every US Google employee (and its subsidiaries, including YouTube) will be eligible to sign up for a free at-home test.

Google is paying its partner, BioIQ, $50 per test, according to the report.

This comes out to $4.5 million per week when multiplied by 90,000 employees (if all of them take the Covid test).

A company spokesperson told The Verge that interns will also be eligible for the program, and it will expand it to international employees in 2021.

Amazon currently offers Covid tests to employees who have to work in a physical location, like a retail location or warehouse.

The search-engine giant has announced to extend its work from home policy till September 2021.

Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai sent an email to staff wherein he communicated that the company is mulling a fully hybrid workforce model.

He said that the company is “testing a hypothesis that a flexible work model will lead to greater productivity, collaboration, and well-being”.

According to Google, its employees may rejoin the workplace for three days a week and work from home on the rest of the days when offices reopen.

The latest announcement by Google to extend the work from a home policy will apply to all 200,000 employees globally.

Google had earlier set January 2021 as a tentative timeline for its workers to return to the office. It revised the work from home policy later till May 2021 if their roles permit.

Google also said that it is looking for opportunities in mid-to-late 2021 to help make Covid-19 vaccines available to its workers, “but only after high-risk and high-priority people globally have received the vaccines”.

Covid-19 vaccination: Can India deliver that shot to all?

TB Team
-
0
Covid-19 vaccination: Can India deliver that shot to all?

As the wealthy nations like the US and the UK begin vaccinating their public, the road ahead for India does not look very rosy as both Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines currently making headlines are yet to reach the country owing to a host of factors including scarce supply, tricky transport and an absence of a proper cold chain.

For over 130 crore Indians, two promising vaccines — Astrazeneca and Oxford university developed and Serum Institute of India (SII)-manufactured Covishield, and Covaxin by Bharat Biotech Ltd – is still a distant dream owing to factors, not in the control of the manufacturers or the government.

Sanjay Rai, who is the principal investigator (PI) of Covaxin trial, told IANS on Friday that the rollout of Covaxin may get delayed as the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), where its Phase-III human clinical trial is underway, is struggling to find takers of the trial shots.

However, Dr Harshal R Salve, Associate Professor at Centre for Community Medicine at AIIMS told IANS on Friday that hopefully, we will see approval for an appropriate vaccine in a month or so by a competent regulatory authority.

“In Phase 1, India is planning to vaccinate 30 crore people – healthcare workers, frontline workers such as military professionals, police force, disaster management workers and people with existing diseases aged more than 60 years,” Salve said.

India has the world’s largest immunization program in the world with a beneficiary of more than 60 million annually.

According to Salve, India has also demonstrated outreach and decentralized delivery of public services during general elections.

“These experiences will help India roll out the Covid-19 vaccination at the mass level. The use of IT is crucial in tracking and implementation individual-level vaccination. However, administration of vaccine should be kept as a voluntary exercise and should not be made mandatory,” Salve stressed.

However, due to scarce data on the Covid-19 vaccination and its mass-level efficacy globally, nothing can be predicted at this crucial moment.

An analysis by Duke University’s ‘Launch and Scale Speedometer’, which is updated every two weeks, shows India has made deals for 1.6 billion doses of three global vaccine candidates upon them being ready and certified for use.

Globally, 10.1 billion doses were reserved even before any candidate was approved for market, showed the data.

“Countries with manufacturing capacity, such as India and Brazil, have been successful in negotiating large advance market commitments with leading vaccine candidates as part of the manufacturing agreements,” according to Duke University’s ‘Launch and Scale Speedometer’.

Dr. Neha Gupta who is an infectious diseases specialist at Medanta Hospital in Gurugram said that the potency of vaccines depends upon the temperature at the storage level.

“Cold chain needs to be properly maintained. The government needs to keep a designated staff for the mass vaccination of healthcare workers, elderly population and patients with common comorbidities like hypertension, COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), diabetes and cardio-cerebrovascular disease,” she told IANS.

The stark reality is that many countries including India may opt to use less protective Covid-19 vaccines that are more affordable and available instead of waiting for better, costlier shots.

But even the lowest reported efficacy so far, for the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine, could powerfully curb Covid-19’s toll.

“If you’d asked me a year ago if we had the opportunity to deliver billions of doses of a vaccine that had 60 per cent, 70 per cent efficacy, we would have been delighted by that prospect,” said Richard Hatchett, who heads the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, in an article in the prestigious journal Science this week.

The Serum Institute of India, the world’s largest producer of vaccines, could boost supplies globally.

“It has signed contracts with the US biotech Novavax to make roughly 1 billion doses of its candidate, which is just about to start a large efficacy trial. And it will supply COVAX with up to 200 million doses of the AstraZeneca-Oxford and Novavax vaccines for low- and middle-income countries,” according to the article.

To avert vaccine inequality, the Covid-19 Vaccines Global Access (COVAX) facility has been set up by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and its partners to help purchase and distribute proven vaccines.

But COVAX is strapped for cash and its impact remains to be seen.

“If in the first six months, Western Europe and the United States are the only regions that are vaccinating people, and other parts of the world are not being vaccinated until the end of 2021, then I think we’re going to have a very, very tense global situation,” infectious disease researcher Jeremy Farrar, who heads the Wellcome Trust research charity, was quoted as saying.

The truth is that current estimates depend on vaccine production running smoothly, and already, Sanofi Pasteur and Novavax have run into manufacturing delays.

“Many factors can trip up a vaccine maker, including shortages of raw materials, equipment, or glass vials. In 2009, the pandemic flu vaccine was delayed because the influenza virus poorly replicated in eggs”.

India has entered a critical stage and an absence of a vaccine for long will only create confusion and further deter millions from taking that elusive shot.

AI-backed Indian sero-survey tech could prioritize Covid vax process

TB Team
-
0
AI-backed Indian sero-survey tech could prioritize Covid vax process

An Indian IT firm, Thalamus Irwine has claimed to have developed an Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Internet of Things (IoT)-based solution, which can assist the government to identify vulnerable communities among the population whose immunization would put brakes on the spread of the Covid-19 infection, through its serosurvey platform named Garuda.

Where the governments generally take months to conduct a zero-study with thousands of samples, the company claims it could conduct seroprevalence study of one crore sample within a week’s time.

Rishabh Sharma, CEO of the firm told IANS that he is also in talks with several state governments to implement his technology in their respective states.

“While I’m not at liberty to disclose the names currently, what I can tell you is that a few states from North India and one from South India are considering the project,” he shared.

Sharma claimed that his technology could help the government in identifying the vulnerable groups which can be authorized vaccines in later stages of immunization to break the chain of infection.

He told IANS that his serosurvey platform can give a map of the community and geographical pockets where least or no immunity has been developed against the COVID-19.

“Our AI-based system can analyze samples tested for Covid-19 in real-time. While the seroprevalence results are out within a few microseconds, the complete analysis of data hardly takes 10 minutes.

“Based on the analysis, we visualize the impact of viruses geographically and demographically as well. We can identify vulnerable populations, predict the future trends as well as monitor the movement of the virus,” he explained.

“If Coronavirus is a fire, then these communities are its oxygen pockets. The virus requires new hosts to sustain its transmission. We have so many small such clusters who have remained untouched by the virus but are susceptible to the infection. There is no real-time information available on them,” Sharma said

“To douse the fire, such communities also need to be vaccinated on priority. It would help build immunity along with the people who received it naturally and the chain would be broken much faster. It will flatten the curve eventually, which is the purpose of the vaccine,” he added.

The Delhi-based company has partnered with ITI, a project under the Department of Telecommunication.

R.M. Agarwal, chairman and managing Director, ITI, had made an official announcement about their partnership with Garuda last week.

“Our efforts with Garuda are in line with the National Digital Health Mission (NDHM), Garuda has also been integrated with Aadhaar already via our Aadhaar services and we are continuing to find new use cases,” he had stated.

While Sharma stated that there is no argument to the fact that healthcare and frontline workers need to receive the jabs on utmost priority, he also added that the authorization post the priority immunization must be done based on sero-study.

“I can not dictate the vaccine prioritization. But I would suggest that an informed strategy would prove much effective in controlling the infection. For that, data can be extrapolated over a large population and understand the movement of the virus across the country,” Sharma clarified.

Prabhakaran Dorairaj, Professor of Epidemiology, Public Health Foundation of India, said that an AI-based can be helpful in vaccine authorization as it could study a large base of the population if proven cost-effective.

“The arguments of the firm are valid. However, we have to see if the cost incurred in the project is feasible. The upcoming vaccines are expected to be pegged below Rs 1,000 per vial. If the test costs higher than the vaccine itself, then it is of no use,” he told IANS.

Sharma said that the cost of the test is pegged around Rs 1,000 per sample. However, the price of devices can be lowered further if they start being manufactured in the country, he added.

Currently, the Garuda platform uses testing machines produced by Boditech Med Inc, a biotechnology company based out of South Korea, Sharma informed. The testing kits are approved by the Drug Controller General of India (DCGI) and validated by ICMR, he added.

India to produce 300mn doses of Sputnik V vaccine in 2021: Report

TB Team
-
0
India to produce 300mn doses of Sputnik V vaccine in 2021: Report

India will produce about 300 million doses of the Russian Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine in 2021, the head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) Kirill Dmitriev said in an interview with a TV channel.

“In India, we have agreements with four large manufacturers. …India will produce about 300 million doses or more of the vaccine for us next year,” he was quoted as saying to Rossiya 24 TV channel by TASS news agency on Thursday.

RDIF is Russia’s sovereign wealth fund.

Dmitriev noted that out of 110 production sites that negotiated production of Sputnik V, RDIF chose 10 that meet its requirements.

“The Russian Sputnik V will be actively produced in the world and we see that this is built on a safe platform based on the human adenovirus,” Dmitriev said.

Earlier Dmitriev said that production of Sputnik V began in other countries, in particular in India, Korea, Brazil, and China.

Registered by Russia on August 11, Sputnik V became the world’s first coronavirus vaccine.

The vaccine was developed by the Gamaleya National Research Center of Epidemiology and Microbiology.

Its post-registration trials began in Moscow on September 7, with volunteers receiving the first vaccine on September 9.

A total of 40,000 people are involved in the program.

RDIF supports the development of Russia’s Covid-19 vaccine by the Gamaleya Center and is investing in mass production of the vaccine by RDIF portfolio companies.

T’gana logs 509 new Covid cases, recovery rate nears 97%

TB Team
-
0
T’gana logs 509 new Covid cases, recovery rate nears 97%

A total of 509 new positive cases were detected and three persons died of Covid-19 and comorbidities in Telangana during the last 24 hours. The recovery rate improved to 96.89 percent against the national average of 95.3 percent. health officials said on Thursday.

With the fresh fatalities, the death toll mounted to 1,505 while new cases took the state’s tally to 2,79,644.

The state’s Covid fatality rate remains at 0.53 percent against the national average of 1.5 percent. According to the director of public health and family welfare, 44.96 percent of the deaths were due to Covid while the remaining 55.04 were on account of comorbidities.

The state continues to record more recoveries than new cases. A total of 517 people recovered from the virus, taking the cumulative numbers to 2,70,967.

The state now has 7,172 active cases and of the 5,063 are in-home or institutional isolation.

Over 90 percent of beds in the government-run and private hospitals treating Covid-19 in the state remained vacant.

Out of 8,561 beds available in 61 government hospitals treating Covid, 7,797 beds were vacant. A total of 764 people were undergoing treatment in these hospitals.

Similarly, in 220 private hospitals treating Covid, only 1,345 beds were occupied. Out of 7,935 beds, 6,590 were vacant.

Of the new cases reported during the last 24 hours, Greater Hyderabad accounted for 104. The daily count in districts remained in single or double digits. Medchal Malkajgiri district saw the second-highest number of new cases at 45 followed by Rangareddy (42), Warangal Urban (27), Khammam (25), and Siddipet (19).

Of the 48,651 tests conducted during the last 24 hours, the government-run laboratories accounted for 45,025 while the remaining 3,627 samples were tested in private labs.

Samples tested per million population ratio rose further to 1,69,435.

The daily testing target for the state is 5,600 per day as per the World Health Organisation (WHO) benchmark of 140 per million per day, officials said

Eighteen government-run laboratories, 56 private laboratories, and 1,076 Rapid Antigen test centers are conducting the tests in the state.

Out of the total positive cases so far, 70 percent (1,95,751) were asymptomatic while the remaining 30 percent (83,893) were symptomatic.

The data shows that 63.9 percent of those who tested positive so far were aged between 21-50 years. As many as 22.91 percent were aged above 51 years. The positive cases include 13.18 percent who were below 20 years. Of the total cases, 60.44 percent were male, and 39.37 percent female.

‘Covid vax must prevent infection, progression and transmission’

TB Team
-
0
‘Covid vax must prevent infection, progression and transmission’

In order to make the global Covid-19 vaccination program successful, the available vaccines must be able to do all three of — prevent infection becoming established in an individual, prevent disease progression and prevent onward transmission, say researchers.

“Whether all three of these goals will be met by ‘first generation’ vaccines is not known, but is vital to the long-term success of the program,” said the study published in the journal Anaesthesia.

“Preventing onward transmission — referred to as ‘sterilizing immunity’ is particularly important as it is epidemic modifying,” said the UK’s influential Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) committee.

“It is possible that the first vaccines, including those being released now, maybe more effective in preventing disease progression and hospitalization and less effective in preventing transmission,” explained study senior author Jeremy Farrar from SAGE.

“Knowledge of their performance in pre-approval trials and in surveillance trials after licensure will enable further modifications such that improved second and third-generation vaccines may be available later in 2021 and beyond,” Farrar added.

They also emphasise the importance of prioritizing those most vulnerable and healthcare workers before the wider population.

The authors stated, “Vaccination is a global rather than a national necessity.”

The World Health Organisation (WHO) ACT-accelerator and COVAX initiatives both emphasize the importance of vaccines reaching the most vulnerable and healthcare workers in all countries at a similar time.

Widespread vaccination of one or a few countries without addressing this need globally is in no one’s interests and will not provide the protection we all need.

“No country has mounted a whole population vaccination campaign in living memory, and it will need to be undertaken with local leadership and cultural sensitivity,” the experts stressed.

They also discussed the implications of the widespread vaccination and the challenges for those who don’t get vaccinated.

They asked: “Will a certificate of vaccination (a vaccine passport) be a requirement for patients and their families before elective surgery, or to work in the health or social care, to travel abroad, or to attend medical conferences, or even to participate in the Olympics?

The authors make clear the vaccine is not a panacea, and that SARS-CoV-2 will only be brought fully under control by also continuing to adapt our behavior, plus better access to diagnostics and treatments, but add: “safe and effective vaccines will undoubtedly change the trajectory of the pandemic, rebuild confidence and start to return the world to the ‘pre-COVID’ era.”

“There is no merit or safety in creating high rates of vaccination and low rates of disease inside one country’s borders if this is not replicated throughout the rest of the world. We really are all in this together,” they concluded.

Kerala reports 5,218 new Covid cases, 33 deaths

TB Team
-
0
Kerala reports 5,218 new Covid cases, 33 deaths

Covid-19 cases in Kerala on Tuesday reported 5,218 fresh after testing 56,453 samples in the past 24 hours. Giving the Covid figures, state Health Minister K.K. Shailaja said in a statement that 5,066 people got cured in the past 24 hours, taking the total number of recoveries in the state to 6,16,666.

The day also saw 33 Covid deaths, taking the state’s death toll to 2,680. As many as 3,04,165 people are under observation at various places, including 13,178 at different hospitals. The state presently has 442 hotspots.

How to ensure people get 2nd Covid-19 vaccine dose too?

TB Team
-
0
How to ensure people get 2nd Covid-19 vaccine dose too?

A smartphone-based platform to send reminders or offering a gift card at the time of administering the first dose may help to ensure that people do not miss the second dose of a Covid-19 vaccine, experts have said.

With the first vaccines reaching the public requiring two doses, there is a worry that some people may not take the second dose amid an aggressive disinformation campaign against vaccination.

“There are several factors and behaviors that prevent many well-intentioned people from completing a two-step process, like that recommended for the Covid-19 vaccines,” said Mark Fendrick from the University of Michigan in the US.

“We need to provide everything necessary to support those who receive the first shot to make sure they complete their second dose.”

This lack of completion has been well established for other two-dose vaccines, like those that prevent less contagious and less-lethal conditions, such as shingles, human papillomavirus (HPV), and hepatitis B.

The University of Michigan primary care physician and researcher said that vaccines that require more than one dose create additional behavioral and environmental challenges, including reports of side effects, false claims regarding vaccine safety, logistical barriers, and the politicization of the program, that may deter people from getting vaccinated or returning for their second dose.

Health providers can distribute a card when giving first doses, to help educate patients about the vaccine and to encourage the pre-scheduling of second dose appointments.

A smartphone-based vaccine adherence support program can also be added to optimize vaccine uptake, the University of Michigan said in a statement.

“Smartphone apps and wearables already succeed in getting people to take their medicine, check their blood pressure or blood sugar, or even measure their heart rhythm,” Fendrick said.

Beyond automated reminders, a quick call or email from someone at a trusted source could do wonders, he said. In addition to customized messaging, Fendrick feels that small financial rewards like a $50 gift card would further increase vaccine uptake.

A vaccination campaign against the deadly coronavirus pandemic began in the US on Monday as health workers rolled up their sleeves to get their first shots of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine.

The vaccination regime submitted by Pfizer-BioNTech requires two doses of vaccine to be administered 21 days apart.

Wine, cheese may reduce cognitive decline: Study

TB Team
-
0
Wine, cheese may reduce cognitive decline: Study

Researchers have revealed that diet modifications – including more wine and cheese – may help reduce age-related cognitive decline in later years.

The study, published in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease, is the first of its kind large scale analysis that connects specific foods to later-in-life cognitive acuity.

For the findings, the research team from the Iowa State University in the US analyzed data collected from 1,787 aging adults (from 46 to 77 years of age, at the completion of the study) in the UK.

Participants completed a Fluid Intelligence Test (FIT) as part of a touchscreen questionnaire at baseline (compiled between 2006 and 2010) and then in two follow-up assessments (conducted from 2012 through 2013 and again between 2015 and 2016).

Participants also answered questions about their food and alcohol consumption at baseline and through two follow-up assessments.

The Food Frequency Questionnaire asked participants about their intake of fresh fruit, dried fruit, raw vegetables and salad, cooked vegetables, oily fish, lean fish, processed meat, poultry, beef, lamb, pork, cheese, bread, cereal, tea, and coffee, beer and cider, red wine, white wine and champagne, and liquor.

The findings showed that cheese, by far, was shown to be the most protective food against age-related cognitive problems, even late in life.

The daily consumption of alcohol, particularly red wine, was related to improvements in cognitive function.

The researchers found that weekly consumption of lamb, but not other red meats, was shown to improve long-term cognitive prowess.

Excessive consumption of salt is bad, but only individuals already at risk of Alzheimer’s disease may need to watch their intake to avoid cognitive problems over time.

“Our results suggest that responsibly eating cheese and drinking red wine daily are not just good for helping us cope with our current Covid-19 pandemic, but perhaps also dealing with an increasingly complex world that never seems to slow down,” the study authors wrote.

1...124125126...222Page 125 of 222