FB overrun by vax lies despite denying fuelling hesitancy: Report

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FB overrun by vax lies despite denying fuelling hesitancy: Report

Anti-vaccine activists flooded Facebook to sow doubt about the Covid-19 vaccines, overwhelming efforts to stop them even as the company told the world that it was not responsible for vaccine hesitancy, according to a new report from the Wall Street Journal.

Of about 150,000 users posting in Facebook Groups disabled for spreading Covid-19 misinformation, 5 per cent produced half of the posts, and 1,400 invited half of the new members, one document unearthed by the newspaper found.

The report paints a picture of a company outfoxed by a small but wily group of anti-vaccine activists that it called “big whales”, citing WSJ, USA TODAY reported.

Facebook researchers in May compared the problem to QAnon and allegations of election fraud “with a relatively few number of actors creating a large percentage of the content and growth”.

The other problem — these same activists were targeting comments on Facebook posts, giving the appearance that vaccine skepticism and resistance were more widespread than they were.

In one random sampling, two-third of comments were “anti-vax”, a Facebook researcher found.

In a statement to USA TODAY, Facebook Spokesperson Aaron Simpson said the documents unearthed in the report show the company’s routine process in navigating tough challenges.

“Narrowly characterising leaked documents doesn’t accurately represent the problem, and it also ignores the work that’s been underway to make comments on posts about Covid-19 and vaccines safer and more reliable,” Simpson added.

Antibodies from Covid’s original strain don’t bind to variants: Study

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Antibodies from Covid’s original strain don’t bind to variants: Study

People infected with the original strain of the SARS-CoV2 virus that caused Covid-19 early during the pandemic outbreak produced a consistent antibody response, making two main groups of antibodies to bind to the spike protein on the virus’s outer surface.

However, those antibodies don’t bind well to newer variants, finds a new study, published in the journal Nature Communications.

According to researcher Nicholas Wu from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, characterising what kinds of antibodies the body is most likely to make to fight a natural infection is an important roadmap for vaccine design.

For the study, the researchers mined published papers about Covid-19 patients for data about the sequence of the antibodies they produced.

They focused on antibodies against the spike protein, the part of the virus that binds to receptors on human cells to infect them. The spike protein is the target of most vaccines.

They found that many antibody sequences converged into two main groups, indicating a consistent human immune response to the virus.

“We really focused on characterising the antibodies created in those infected with the original strain of the virus,” said Timothy Tan, a graduate student part of the research.

“Before we started the study, variants weren’t much of a problem. As they emerged, we wanted to see whether the common antibodies we identified were able to bind to newer variants,” Tan added.

The researchers studied the convergent antibodies’ ability to bind to several variants and found that they no longer bound to some.

The finding has implications for the ability of new variants to reinfect people who contracted earlier versions of the virus, as well as for the continuing efficacy of vaccines and the design of possible vaccine boosters.

“Even though this antibody response is very common with the original strain, it doesn’t really interact with variants,” Wu said.

“That, of course, raises the concern of the virus evolving to escape the body’s main antibody response. Some antibodies should still be effective — the body makes antibodies to many parts of the virus, not only the spike protein — but the particular groups of antibodies that we saw in this study will not be as effective,” Wu added.

Global Covid-19 caseload tops 227.5 mn

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Global Covid-19 caseload tops 227.5 mn

The global coronavirus caseload has topped 225.7 million, while the deaths have surged to more than 4.67 million and vaccinations soared to over 5.85 billion, according to the Johns Hopkins University.

In its latest update on Saturday morning, the University’s Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) revealed that the current global caseload, death toll and vaccination tally stood at 227,544,137, 4,678,012 and 5,856,927,079, respectively.

The US continues to be the worst-hit country with the world’s highest number of cases and deaths at 41,946,462 and 672,192, respectively, according to the CSSE.

In terms of infections, India follows in the second place with 33,381,728 cases.

The other worst countries with over 3 million cases are Brazil (21,080,219), the UK (7,405,774), Russia (7,130,245), France (7,029,959), Turkey (6,794,670), Iran (5,396,013), Argentina (5,237,159), Colombia (4,937,596), Spain (4,929,546), Italy (4,627,699), Indonesia (4,185,144), Germany (4,137,062) and Mexico (3,549,229), the CSSE figures showed.

Nations with a death toll of over 100,000 are Brazil (589,573), India (444,248), Mexico (270,348), Peru (198,891), Russia (193,111), Indonesia (140,138), the UK (135,312), Italy (130,233), Colombia (125,826), France (116,618), Iran (116,436) and Argentina (114,286).

UK records another 30,597 Covid-19 cases

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UK records another 30,597 Covid-19 cases

Another 30,597 people in the UK have tested positive for Covid-19, bringing the total number of coronavirus cases in the country to 7,312,683, according to official figures released on Wednesday.

The country also recorded another 201 coronavirus-related deaths.

The total number of coronavirus-related deaths in Britain now stands at 134,647. These figures only include the deaths of people who died within 28 days of their first positive test, Xinhua news agency reported.

The latest data came as modelling prepared for the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE), a British government advisory body, showed that there is still “the potential for another large wave of hospitalizations” after the return of schools and more people going back to their workplaces.

“While the relationship between cases and hospitalizations has changed due to vaccination, increasing cases remain the earliest warning sign that hospital admissions are likely to rise,” the Scientific Pandemic Influenza Group on Modelling Operational sub-group (Spi-M-O) said.

University modelling provided to Spi-M-O showed that the hospital admissions in the next few months could skyrocket to more than 7000 per day.

The British government on Tuesday released a COVID-19 Autumn and Winter Plan, outlining the possible measures and restrictions the country may see towards the end of this year.

According to the plan unveiled by British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, there is “significant uncertainty” about what will happen later this year and there is a “plausible” risk of cases rising to an extent that would place the National Health Service (NHS) under “unsustainable pressure”.

The government’s Plan A consists of a booster jabs campaign which will begin next week, and guidance that people meet outdoors or open windows if inside. “Plan B” could include vaccine passports, compulsory masks and working from home guidance.

Johnson said “Plan B” would aim to prevent the NHS being overwhelmed.

The total number of people in hospital with coronavirus in the country currently stands at 8,340. It has been over 8,000 for eight of the past nine days.

More than 89 percent of people aged 16 and over in Britain have had their first dose of vaccine and more than 81 percent have received both doses, the latest figures showed.

Bat-related coronaviruses more frequent than thought: Study

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Bat-related coronaviruses more frequent than thought: Study

An average of about 400,000 people are infected with severe acute respiratory syndrome-related coronavirus (SARSr-CoVs) annually in South and Southeast Asia, according to a new study.

The study by researchers at Singapore’s Duke-NUS Medical School and US-based non-profit EcoHealth Alliance showed that emerging diseases caused by coronaviruses of likely bat origin (for example SARS, Middle East respiratory syndrome, swine acute diarrhoea syndrome coronavirus and Covid-19) have disrupted global health and economies for two decades.

New evidence, published on preprint server Medrxiv, meaning it has not been peer reviewed yet, suggests that acesome bat SARSr-CoVs could infect people directly, and that their spillover is more frequent than previously recognised”.

“Each zoonotic spillover of a novel virus represents an opportunity for evolutionary adaptation and further spread; therefore, quantifying the extent of this ‘hidden’ spillover may help target prevention programmes,” the researchers said.

For the study, the team derived biologically realistic range distributions for known bat SARSr-CoV hosts and quantified their overlap with human populations.

Using probabilistic risk assessment and data on human-bat contact, human SARSr-CoV seroprevalence, and antibody duration they estimated that about 400,000 people (median: about 50,000) are infected with SARSr-CoVs annually in South and Southeast Asia.

“These data on the geography and scale of spillover can be used to target surveillance and prevention programs for potential future bat-CoV emergence,” the researchers said.

While the exact origins of the SARS-CoV-2, virus that caused Covid-19, remains unclear even after nearly 18 months, the disease likely emerged when a virus that infects horseshoe bats was able to jump to humans — either directly through wildlife-to-human contact, or indirectly by first infecting an intermediate animal host, such as the pangolin.

Horseshoe bats have been known to carry a variety of coronaviruses, including strains that are genetically similar to ones that cause Covid-19 and SARS.

A study published in the open-access journal PLOS ONE in June showed that bats in Switzerland harbour viruses from 39 different viral families, and some have the potential to jump to other animals, including humans, and cause disease.

Another study, published in the journal Nature Food showed that China, Japan, the Philippines, and Thailand may transition into “hotspots” favourable for bats that carry coronaviruses and where conditions are ripe for the diseases to jump from bats to humans.

This is because of the global land-use changes including forest fragmentation, agricultural expansion and concentrated livestock production.

US inflation shows signs of easing in August amid Delta variant surge

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US inflation shows signs of easing in August amid Delta variant surge

US consumer goods prices rose less than expected in August, as inflation showed signs of easing up amid the Delta variant-driven Covid-19 surge and continued supply constraints, the US Labor Department said on Tuesday.

The consumer price index (CPI) increased 0.3 per cent in August after rising 0.5 per cent in July, according to the report released by the department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The latest figure is down markedly from the 0.9 per cent growth pace in June, Xinhua news agency reported.

Over the past 12 months through August, the index increased 5.3 per cent, slightly down from the 5.4 per cent pace in June and July, the report showed.

Excluding the volatile food and energy components, the so-called core CPI edged up 0.1 per cent last month after increasing 0.3 per cent in July. In June, the core CPI soared by 0.9 per cent.

Compared with a year earlier, the core CPI rose 4 per cent in August, also a smaller increase than the 4.3 per cent growth in July, the report showed.

“Inflation has begun to show signs of cooling in response to the Delta variant but the level of prices remains extremely elevated, especially for big-ticket items,” Diane Swonk, chief economist at Grant Thornton, a major accounting firm, said in a blog.

She noted that new vehicle prices, in particular, jumped 1.2 per cent in August and were up a whopping 7.6 per cent from a year ago.

“Shortages of dealer inventories are so acute that some smaller dealerships are worried about going out of business. They can’t carry the costs of overhead without the vehicles to sell,” she said.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the food index increased 0.4 per cent in August after larger increases in recent months, with the index for meats, poultry, fish, and eggs rising 0.7 per cent over the month. The beef index soared 1.7 per cent.

The energy index, meanwhile, rose 2.0 per cent in August, its third consecutive monthly increase.

The gasoline index rose 2.8 per cent in August, faster than the 2.4 per cent growth in July.

“The basics of food and energy costs are also elevated, which is crimping consumer budgets,” Swonk said.

Swonk also noted that energy prices are expected to move even higher given the damage to refining facilities following Hurricane Ida, which ups the commuting costs for low-wage workers who cannot work from home.

Scientists who declined lab-leak theory linked to Wuhan lab: Report

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Scientists who declined lab-leak theory linked to Wuhan lab: Report

Scientists who declined the theory that Covid-19 leaked from China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) had connections to the infamous lab, according to media reports.

All but one of the scientists who signed a letter published in The Lancet on March 7 last year rejecting the lab-leak theory had links to Chinese researchers, their colleagues or funders, The Telegraph reported.

The Lancet letter, signed by 27 scientists and initiated by British zoologist Peter Daszak, effectively shut down scientific debate into whether Coronavirus was manipulated or leaked from the Chinese lab.

Daszak is the president of the US-based nonprofit EcoHealth Alliance that has a direct connection with China. The firm has also funded research at the WIV.

The signatories stated that they “strongly condemned the conspiracy theories” surrounding the Coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan, the report said.

The shocking revelation, made using a Freedom of Information request, revealed that an email sent by Daszak on February 8 revealed that he was urged to pen the letter by “our collaborators” in China for a “show of support”.

While Daszak eventually declared his involvement in the EcoHealth Alliance, he failed to mention that five other signatories also worked for the organisation, the Express.co.uk said citing the newspaper.

Further, three of the signatories to the Lancet letter were from Britain’s Wellcome Trust, which has also funded work at the WIV. One of the signatories, Sir Jeremy Farrar, a member of Sage and the director of the Trust, describes George Gao, the head of the Wuhan Centre for Disease Control, as an “old friend”.

Gao, who is also a former Wellcome Trust research assistant, had supported Daszak’s nomination to the National Academy of Sciences, the report said.

Even after almost two years since Covid-19 was first detected in the Chinese city of Wuhan, the question of the virus’ origin still remains unanswered. Many claims have been made by several scientists and governments globally. The recent US intelligence report also could not yield a definitive conclusion as to whether the new Coronavirus jumped to humans naturally, or was it the result of a lab leak.

Meanwhile, the claims of US involvement have also been strong.

A new book by Australian investigative journalist Sharri Markson claimed that the US cash funded the infamous Wuhan virology lab. The book also claimed that the controversial research to make diseases more potent was backed by Anthony Fauci, US’ top infectious disease expert, Markson wrote in The Times.

Similarly, over 3,000 pages of Fauci’s work emails during the pandemic between January and June 2020, obtained by the Washington Post, Buzzfeed News and CNN through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), raised questions on whether he backed Chinese denials of the theory that Covid-19 leaked from a lab in Wuhan.

Global Covid-19 caseload tops 225.2 mn

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Global Covid-19 caseload tops 225.2 mn

The global coronavirus caseload has topped 225.2 million, while the deaths have surged to more than 4.63 million and vaccinations soared to over 5.71 billion, according to the Johns Hopkins University.

In its latest update on Tuesday morning, the University’s Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) revealed that the current global caseload, death toll and vaccination tally stood at 225,213,795, 4,638,244 and 5,718,110,459, respectively.

The US continues to be the worst-hit country with the world’s highest number of cases and deaths at 41,209,851 and 661,537, respectively, according to the CSSE.

In terms of infections, India follows in the second place with 33,264,175 cases.

The other worst countries with over 3 million cases are Brazil (21,006,424), the UK (7,290,046), Russia (7,055,296), France (6,992,980), Turkey (6,682,834), Iran (5,318,327), Argentina (5,226,831), Colombia (4,931,563), Spain (4,915,265), Italy (4,609,205), Indonesia (4,170,088), Germany (4,093,412) and Mexico (3,511,882), the CSSE figures showed.

In terms of deaths, Brazil comes second with 587,066 fatalities.

Nations with a death toll of over 100,000 are India (442,874), Mexico (267,748), Peru (198,764), Russia (190,031), Indonesia (139,165), the UK (134,586), Italy (129,955), Colombia (125,687), France (116,245), Iran (114,759) and Argentina (113,640).

Pfizer initially rejected BioNTech’s offer to develop Covid vaccine

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Pfizer initially rejected BioNTech’s offer to develop Covid vaccine

US drug maker Pfizer wrongly assumed that the coronavirus outbreak would be quickly contained and thus declined the offer made by BioNTech to develop a vaccine against the infectious disease that has so far claimed more than 4 million lives globally.

Germany-based BioNTech, now capitalised at US$84 billion, helmed by Turkish couple Dr Ugur Sahin and his wife Dr Ozlem Tureci, were given a “no” by the pharmaceutical giant as the virus was starting to sweep the globe in January 2020, the Telegraph reported.

“Guys, this is not going to work, they were told by Dr Phil Dormitzer, Pfizer’s Vice President and Chief Scientific Officer for vaccines. Dormitzer also considered it to be too experimental,” the report said.

“My working assumption was that it (Covid-19) would be controlled” like the SARS and MERS outbreaks, Dormitzer later confirmed.

It is because Dormitzer had been involved with discussions about whether to create vaccines for MERS and SARS, only to see the pathogens quickly contained.

However, it was only a “matter of time” before Pfizer changed its mind and a deal was announced between the two companies a month later.

So far, about 1.4 billion doses of Pfizer and BioNTech two-dose revolutionary Covid jab, developed based on mRNA technology, has been shipped to more than 120 countries.

BioNTech founders revealed the story of initial rejection by Pfizer in a new book titled The Vaccine, written by journalist Joe Miller, to be released this week, the report said.

It also accounts how the couple, who emigrated to Germany from Turkey as small children and met on a cancer ward as young doctors, built not one billion-dollar biotech company but two. And how they gambled everything to pivot BioNTech to focus exclusively on a Covid vaccine in early 2020, it added.

158 dengue cases reported in Delhi during Jan-Sep 2021

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158 dengue cases reported in Delhi during Jan-Sep 2021

As many as 158 dengue, 68 malaria and 40 cases of chikungunya have been reported this year in the national capital, said a report released by the Delhi civic bodies on Monday.

As Delhi receives continuous rain, the number of people falling prey to vector-borne diseases such as dengue, malaria and chikungunya is witnessing a rapid surge.

As per the Delhi civic bodies’ report, data shows that 34 cases of dengue have been reported till now during September in the city. However, no deaths have been reported so far.

During the first four days of September, not a single case of dengue was reported in the city which means that the number of cases are witnessing a sudden surge in a short span.

According to the report, a total of 47 cases have been reported so far in the South Delhi Municipal Corporation area. Thirty cases in the North Delhi Municipal Corporation area and 18 cases in the East Delhi Municipal Corporation area have also come to light.

However, seven dengue cases were reported in New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC) area and two in Delhi Cantt area while 54 patients could not be confirmed to be suffering from dengue.

Dengue is caused by mosquitoes breeding in clean and stagnant water whereas malaria is caused by mosquitoes breeding in dirty water as well.

Delhi has received heavy rain in the last few days which has resulted in water-logging at various places. With the accumulation of rain water, the risk of dengue spreading remains high.

According to the data on dengue cases this year, there were no cases in Delhi during January. However, two cases in February, five in March, 10 in April, 12 in May, seven in June, 16 in July and 72 cases of malaria had been reported in August.

However, dengue and chikungunya causing mosquitoes do not infect people at large distances but infect people residing within 50 metres of stagnant water.

Delhi’s civic bodies are working together to spread awareness among people about the spread of vector-borne diseases. Various measures are being taken to check the surge in the number of infections. Despite all these efforts, the situation remains alarming on the ground.

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