Vaccine produced by French company uses inactivated Sars-CoV-2 virus and can be stored in fridge

Valneva Covid vaccine could be as effective as Oxford jab, study suggests

NHS England release statistics after evidence Covid can cause serious problems for mothers-to-be and their babies

One in six most critically ill NHS Covid patients are unvaccinated pregnant women

With a dataset of testing and case counts from over 1,400 institutions of higher education (IHEs) in the United States, we analyze the number of infections and deaths from SARS-CoV-2 in the counties surrounding these IHEs during the Fall 2020 semester (August to December, 2020). We used a matching procedure designed to create groups of counties that are aligned along age, race, income, population, and urban/rural categories—socio-demographic variables that have been shown to be correlated with COVID-19 outcomes. We find that counties with IHEs that remained primarily online experienced fewer cases and deaths during the Fall 2020 semester; whereas before and after the semester, these two groups had almost identical COVID-19 incidence. Additionally, we see fewer deaths in counties with IHEs that reported conducting any on-campus testing compared to those that reported none. We complement the statistical analysis with a case study of IHEs in Massachusetts—a rich data state in our dataset—which further highlights the importance of IHE-affiliated testing for the broader community. The results in this work suggest that campus testing can itself be thought of as a mitigation policy and that allocating additional resources to IHEs to support efforts to regularly test students and staff would be beneficial to mitigating the spread of COVID-19 in the general population.

10.1101/2021.10.07.21264419

Higher education responses to COVID-19 in the United States: Evidence for the impacts of university policy

A new study reports that the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) induces protective tissue memory that includes both humoral and cellular elements to protect specific tissue sites, such as the lung and lung-associated lymph nodes, against infection.

SARS-CoV-2 induces tissue immune memory

An estimated 43,000 people given incorrect negative PCR results, says government health agency

Covid testing suspended at private UK lab over potentially inaccurate results

It'd be nice if boosters could speed up a little more. Earliest data (1st October) showed a backlog of 3.1m doses (eligible minus given). Now it's 4.1m.

Ivermectin was first identified in the 1970s during a veterinary drug screening project at Merck Pharmaceuticals. It was approved in 1981 for commercial use in veterinary medicine for parasitic infections in livestock and domestic pets with the brand name Mectizan. In the years since it was approved to treat river blindness, ivermectin was also shown to be highly effective against other parasitic infections.

Ivermectin Treats Many Infections in Humans – Just Not COVID-19

10.1038/s41586-021-04069-y

The evolution of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic continuously produces new variants, which warrant timely epidemiological characterisation. Here we use the dense genomic surveillance generated by the COVID-19 Genomics UK Consortium to reconstruct the dynamics of 71 different lineages in each of 315 English local authorities between September 2020 and June 2021. This analysis reveals a series of sub-epidemics that peaked in the early autumn of 2020, followed by a jump in transmissibility of the B.1.1.7/Alpha lineage. Alpha grew when other lineages declined during the second national lockdown and regionally tiered restrictions between November and December 2020. A third more stringent national lockdown suppressed Alpha and eliminated nearly all other lineages in early 2021. However, a series of variants (mostly containing the spike E484K mutation) defied these trends and persisted at moderately increasing proportions. Accounting for sustained introductions, however, indicates that their transmissibility is unlikely to have exceeded that of Alpha. Finally, B.1.617.2/Delta was repeatedly introduced to England and grew rapidly in the early summer of 2021, constituting approximately 98% of sampled SARS-CoV-2 genomes on 26 June. Download PDF

Genomic reconstruction of the SARS-CoV-2 epidemic in England

Data shows first time doses increased after B.C. announced vaccine passports, but have since tapered off

Convenience, confidence and complacency: Why some formerly hesitant people are now getting vaccinated

Instead of relying on vaccines alone, countries such as France and Germany are using extra measures to keep cases and deaths low

Why is England doing worse against Covid than its European neighbours?

Campaigners have been gathering outside schools, handing out what they claim are legal documents or "notices of liability" to head teachers, warning them not to vaccinate children.

Covid: Misleading vaccine claims target children and parents

10.31219/osf.io/72abp

The manuscript from Subramanian and Kumar shows a lack of vaccine efficacy on Covid Incidence. However, this paper suffers major pitfalls : inadequate outcome, lack of confounding factors, inadequate time period (7 days), inclusion/exclusion criteria not respected, causal inference from inappropriate data, and erroneous interpretation of the data. We comment on these issues in detail and show that Subramanian and Kumar’s paper is flawed and misleading.

Vaccination rates and COVID-19 cases: a commentary of “Increases in COVID-19 are unrelated to levels of vaccination across 68 countries and 2947 counties in the United States.”

So, in the end, 0.3% of employees didn't comply with the company's vaccine mandate.

When asked on @CBSMornings about the company's vaccine mandate for staff, the CEO of @united airlines also said, "Out of our 67,000 U.S. employees, there are 232 who haven't been vaccinated. They are going through the termination process."

Slower vaccination rates in east lead to dramatic surge in cases, while UK remains outlier in west

UK’s high Covid case rates buck trend as western Europe outperforms east

So-called natural immunity varies from patient to patient, scientists say. Immunization is still the best choice after recovering from the disease.

If You’ve Had Covid, Do You Need the Vaccine?

Wales is first with their vaccine stock data this week, with a solid 1.6m new doses made available to the UK roll-out programmes. Again, the comically slow progress of the teen and 50+ roll-out is not down to supply.

Health leaders must seize this historic opportunity to level upThe effect of the pandemic on non-covid related healthcare is only now starting to be felt by patients and healthcare systems. At least 4.5 million people are estimated to be waiting for elective care in the UK,1 and the backlog may rise to 13 million2 and take over a decade to clear. The backlog arose after a sharp fall in patient demand at the height of the first wave of the pandemic in the spring and summer of 2020 (driven by the instruction to stay at home to protect the NHS and a fear of coming to hospital) coupled with reduced capacity as resources were rightly allocated to meet the needs of people with covid-19.

10.1136/bmj.n2456

Ensuring an equitable recovery for the NHS

Science is about rational disagreement, the questioning and testing of orthodoxy and the constant search for truth. With something like lockdown – an untested policy that affects millions – rigorous debate and the basics of verification/falsification are more important than ever. Academics backing lockdown (or any major theory) ought to welcome challenges, knowing – as scientists do – that robust challenge is the way to identify error, improve policy and save lives.

Covid, lockdown and the retreat of scientific debate

BACKGROUND Following administration to persons 60+ years of age, the booster vaccination campaign in Israel was gradually expanded to younger age groups who received a second dose >5 months earlier. We study the booster effect on COVID-19 outcomes.METHODS We extracted data for the period July 30, 2021 to October 6, 2021 from the Israeli Ministry of Health database regarding 4,621,836 persons. We compared confirmed Covid-19 infections, severe illness, and death of those who received a booster ≥12 days earlier (booster group) with a nonbooster group. In a secondary analysis, we compared the rates 3-7 days with ≥12 days after receiving the booster dose. We used Poisson regressions to estimate rate ratios after adjusting for possible confounding factors.RESULTS Confirmed infection rates were ≈10-fold lower in the booster versus nonbooster group (ranging 8.8-17.6 across five age groups) and 4.8-11.2 fold lower in the secondary analysis. Severe illness rates in the primary and secondary analysis were 18.7-fold (95% CI, 15.7-22.4) and 6.5-fold (95% CI, 5.1-8.3) lower for ages 60+, and 22.0-fold (95% CI, 10.3-47.0) and 3.2-fold (95% CI, 1.1-9.6) lower for ages 40-60. For ages 60+, COVID-19 associated death rates were 14.7-fold (95% CI, 9.4-23.1) lower in the primary analysis and 4.8-fold (95% CI, 2.8-8.2) lower in the secondary analysis.CONCLUSIONS Across all age groups, rates of confirmed infection and severe illness were substantially lower among those who received a booster dose of the BNT162b2 vaccine.

10.1101/2021.10.07.21264626

Protection Across Age Groups of BNT162b2 Vaccine Booster against Covid-19

Two studies from Israel quantify the risk of myocarditis following the Pfizer–BioNTech shot, with one suggesting the chance of developing the condition is about one in 50,000.

Heart-inflammation risk from Pfizer COVID vaccine is very low

A total of 49,158,835 people have now had their first dose of a coronavirus vaccine (85.5% of the population aged 12 and over), after a further 26,157 jabs were given yesterday.

COVID-19: UK reports 34,574 more coronavirus cases and another 38 deaths

Sweden, Norway, and Finland suspended the use of Moderna’s covid-19 vaccine on 7 October after reports of possible rare side effects.The pause “for precautionary reasons” in Sweden and Finland concerns anyone born 1991 or later. In Finland, under 30s will now be offered the Pfizer vaccine as their second dose. Swedish officials are still discussing the second dose for the 81 000 under 30s who received a first dose of Moderna.In Norway officials have suspended the use of Moderna’s vaccine in those under 18, advising that they are offered the Pfizer vaccine instead.At a press conference on 6 October Anders Tegnell, epidemiologist at the Swedish Public Health Agency, explained that the suspension of the Moderna vaccine followed the detection of signals of an increased risk of side effects such as myocarditis and pericarditis.

10.1136/bmj.n2477

Covid-19: Sweden, Norway, and Finland suspend use of Moderna vaccine in young people “as a precaution”

Six months after the second dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech covid-19 vaccine, antibody concentrations in healthcare workers had decreased substantially, especially among older men and immunosuppressed people, a study has found.1The Israeli researchers carried out a six month longitudinal prospective study that involved monthly antibody testing of around 4000 vaccinated healthcare workers. At six months the mixed-model analysis showed decreases in antibody concentrations of 38% for IgG antibodies and 42% for neutralising antibodies among those aged 65 years or older, when compared with participants aged 18-45. Decreases of 37% (IgG) and 46% (neutralising) were also seen in men 65 years of age or older when compared with women in the same age group.The study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, reported that immunosuppressed people had decreases in antibody concentrations of 65% (IgG) and 70% (neutralising) compared with participants without immunosuppression, while people with a BMI of 30 or over had 31% higher neutralising antibody concentrations, when compared with those whose BMI was under 30.

10.1136/bmj.n2481

Covid-19: Antibody levels fall after second Pfizer dose, but protection against severe disease remains, studies indicate

10.1038/s41586-021-04085-y

The emergence of SARS-CoV-2 variants with mutations in major neutralizing antibody-binding sites can affect humoral immunity induced by infection or vaccination1–6. We analysed the development of anti-SARS-CoV-2 antibody and T cell responses in previously infected (recovered) or uninfected (naive) individuals that received mRNA vaccines to SARS-CoV-2. While previously infected individuals sustained higher antibody titres than uninfected individuals post-vaccination, the latter reached comparable levels of neutralization responses to the ancestral strain after the second vaccine dose. T cell activation markers measured upon spike or nucleocapsid peptide in vitro stimulation showed a progressive increase after vaccination. Comprehensive analysis of plasma neutralization using 16 authentic isolates of distinct locally circulating SARS-CoV-2 variants revealed a range of reduction in the neutralization capacity associated with specific mutations in the spike gene: lineages with E484K and N501Y/T (e.g., B.1.351 and P.1) had the greatest reduction, followed by lineages with L452R (e.g., B.1.617.2). While both groups retained neutralization capacity against all variants, plasma from previously infected vaccinated individuals displayed overall better neutralization capacity when compared to plasma from uninfected individuals that also received two vaccine doses, pointing to vaccine boosters as a relevant future strategy to alleviate the impact of emerging variants on antibody neutralizing activity.

Impact of circulating SARS-CoV-2 variants on mRNA vaccine-induced immunity

A qualitative study of adults aged 16 to 29 years looking into reasons why they are hesitant towards a coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccine.

Coronavirus vaccine hesitancy in younger adults: June 2021

Largest study of its kind also finds vaccines appear to protect against worst effects of Delta variant

French study of over 22m people finds vaccines cut severe Covid risk by 90%

Report comes as government scientific adviser describes Tuesday’s maskless cabinet meeting as ‘toxic’ for public adherence

More than 4m stopped wearing masks this summer in Britain, ONS data shows

On the J&J booster news, keep in mind: 1. Median follow-up since 2nd dose was just 36 days, 2. Efficacy vs moderate COVID was 75% globally, and 3. total number of cases in the US was 15. Please don't take this to mean that a 2nd dose provides long-term increase in protection.

Hmm okay. J&J two dose results are a bit more complicated, with different results globally versus within the US.

A second dose of Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine substantially increased its protection against Covid-19, the company announced Tuesday morning.

An extra J. & J. shot substantially boosts protection against Covid, the company reports.

Joe Biden has introduced a vaccine mandate affecting millions, but some countries have gone further

Which countries are enforcing mandatory Covid jabs – and how?

School mask mandates have generated controversy in many parts of the country. Now, two studies, published on Friday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, provide additional evidence that masks protect children from the coronavirus, even when community rates are high and the contagious Delta variant is circulating.

U.S. schools with mask requirements are seeing fewer outbreaks, the C.D.C. finds.

A new poll suggests tensions over COVID-19 vaccines in Canada are high as frictions grow between those who are vaccinated against the virus and those who are not.

Tensions high between vaccinated and unvaccinated in Canada, poll suggests

Will the large numbers of people with disabilities from COVID make our society more accessible and inclusive?

Like polio, the long-term impact of COVID will be measured in disabilityPractically everyone, from public health officials to political pundits to social media commentators, has framed the threat of COVID-19 in terms of its mortality rate. But as cultural historian Ainsley Hawthorn writes, COVID is going to injure many more people than it kills.Social Sharing

People who had the coronavirus and then got the vaccine may be at an extreme advantage. Here's how.

New Study Finds A Huge Perk Of Getting Vaccinated After Having COVID

Provincial change comes after 3 school districts made own decisions to tighten rules

B.C. expands mask mandate in schools to include kindergarten to Grade 3 after community outcryThe mask mandate for schools in B.C. is being expanded to include staff and students in kindergarten to Grade 3 as of Monday, provincial officials announced Friday after three school districts made their own decisions to tighten the rules.Social Sharing

We know, we know: Vaccines are a polarizing topic which is all the reason to take note of where they’re mandatory. More and more countries are requiring vaccinations for all tourists in an effort to keep everyone safe while new variants take hold. Travelers themselves are also putting themselves at higher risk when leaving home. That might be a calculated risk, or perhaps an essential trip where you don’t have much choice, but if you’re looking for extra peace of mind, these countries require travelers to be fully vaccinated.

Forbes Advisor Guide To Covid Vaccine Requirements For Travel

Now that covid-19 vaccination of children in the UK is starting, it is essential that the legal basis of consent is well understoodA Court of Appeal, on 17 September 2021, overturned a previous High Court ruling and decided that parental consent is not needed for children under 16 to take puberty blockers.1 This reaffirms, again, that the responsibility to consent to treatment depends on the ability of medical staff to decide on the capacity of those who are under 16.

10.1136/bmj.n2356

Consent for covid-19 vaccination in children

Vaccine hesitancy is “not a stable trait,” concludes a new American study, which found that a majority of initially hesitant respondents shifted their stance in favour of getting the jab.

The COVID-19 vaccine-shy are changing their minds

Slowed canonical progress in large fields of science

10.1073/pnas.2021636118

In many academic fields, the number of papers published each year has increased significantly over time. Policy measures aim to increase the quantity of scientists, research funding, and scientific output, which is measured by the number of papers produced. These quantitative metrics determine the career trajectories of scholars and evaluations of academic departments, institutions, and nations. Whether and how these increases in the numbers of scientists and papers translate into advances in knowledge is unclear, however. Here, we first lay out a theoretical argument for why too many papers published each year in a field can lead to stagnation rather than advance. The deluge of new papers may deprive reviewers and readers the cognitive slack required to fully recognize and understand novel ideas. Competition among many new ideas may prevent the gradual accumulation of focused attention on a promising new idea. Then, we show data supporting the predictions of this theory. When the number of papers published per year in a scientific field grows large, citations flow disproportionately to already well-cited papers; the list of most-cited papers ossifies; new papers are unlikely to ever become highly cited, and when they do, it is not through a gradual, cumulative process of attention gathering; and newly published papers become unlikely to disrupt existing work. These findings suggest that the progress of large scientific fields may be slowed, trapped in existing canon. Policy measures shifting how scientific work is produced, disseminated, consumed, and rewarded may be called for to push fields into new, more fertile areas of study.

Dr. Peter Hotez, the direct of the Center for Vaccine Development at Texas Children’s Hospital, spoke with CNN’s Ana Cabrera on Thursday about the impact of Covid misinformation and how the high number of deaths, especially in the Hispanic community, would cause lasting harm.

Doctor on CNN Alarmed by ‘Historic Decimation’ in Hispanic Communities from Covid: The PTSD ‘Will Last a Generation’

10.31234/osf.io/dah3x

Exponential growth is frequently underestimated, an error that can have a heavy social cost in the context of epidemics. To clarify its origins, we measured the human capacity to extrapolate linear and exponential trends in scatterplots. Four factors were manipulated: the function underlying the data (linear or exponential), the response modality (pointing or venturing a number), the scale on the y axis (linear or logarithmic), and the amount of noise in the data. While linear extrapolation was precise and largely unbiased, we observed a consistent underestimation of noisy exponential growth, present for both pointing and numerical responses. A biased ideal-observer model could explain these data as an occasional misperception of noisy exponential graphs as quadratic curves. Importantly, this underestimation bias was mitigated by participants’ math knowledge, by using a logarithmic scale, and by presenting a noiseless exponential curve rather than a noisy data plot, thus suggesting concrete avenues for interventions.

Analyzing the misperception of exponential growth in graphs.

10.31234/osf.io/fsnvy

The uncertainty of the COVID-19 pandemic highlights the importance of understanding how attitudes towards uncertainty affect well-being. Intolerance of uncertainty is a trait associated with anxiety, worry, and mood disorders. As adaptive emotion regulation supports well-being and mental health, it is possible that intolerance of uncertainty decreases the capacity to use adaptive emotion regulation and increases the use of maladaptive strategies. However, little research exists on the relationship between intolerance of uncertainty and use of cognitive emotion regulation strategies, such as reappraisal and suppression. Study 1 demonstrated that scores on the Intolerance of Uncertainty Scale were associated with greater worry related to the COVID-19 pandemic, decreased capacity to implement reappraisal, and greater self-reported use of suppression in daily life. Study 2 provided a preregistered replication of these findings. These results suggest that intolerance of uncertainty may impact mental health by reducing the capacity and tendency to use adaptive emotion regulation.

The Impact of Intolerance of Uncertainty on Reappraisal and Suppression

10.31234/osf.io/m7w9y

The COVID-19 pandemic caused millions of deaths and unprecedented disruptions on societies. Negative impacts are coupled with optimism the pandemic may shift public opinion on other cross-national crises. Comparing matched samples of New Zealanders assessed before and after nationwide lockdowns in 2020 (Ns = 15,815), we show the pandemic enhanced participants’ political efficacy, which in turn amplified respondents’ pro-environmental attitudes. Climate beliefs and concern increased as a function of political efficacy, and similar effects were observed for support for a government subsidy for public transport and decrease in support for government spending on new motorways. The crisis might offer a window-of-opportunity to foster sustainability actions.

Political efficacy explains increase in New Zealanders’ pro-environmental attitudes due to COVID-19

10.31234/osf.io/6gjh8

Many people practiced COVID-19-related safety measures in the first year of the pandemic, but Republicans were less likely to engage in behaviors such as wearing masks or face coverings than Democrats, suggesting radical disparities in health practices split along political fault lines. We developed an “intervention tournament” which aimed to identify the framings that would promote mask wearing among a representative sample of Republicans and Democrats in the U.S. (N = 4,931). Seven different conditions reflecting different moral values and factors specific to COVID-19—including protection from harm (self), protection from harm (community), patriotic duty, purity, reviving the economy, threat, and scientific evidence—were implemented to identify which framings would “win” in terms of promoting mask wearing compared to a baseline condition. We found that Republicans had significantly more negative attitudes toward masks, lower intentions to wear them, and were less likely to sign or share pledges on social media than Democrats, which was partially mediated by Republicans, compared to Democrats, perceiving that the threat of COVID-19 was lower. None of our framing conditions significantly affected Republicans’ or Democrats’ attitudes, intentions, or behaviors compared to the baseline condition, illustrating the difficulty in overcoming the strength of political polarization during COVID-19.

Persuading Republicans and Democrats to Comply with Mask Wearing: An Intervention Tournament

Results of two studies may explain why some people develop diabetes after catching the virus

Covid can infect cells in pancreas that make insulin, research shows

Advocacy organisation condemns rollout failures, including difficulties securing appointments, inaccessible environments and challenges for those requiring sedation

Young Australians with disabilities face significant barriers to getting Covid vaccine