Category: Health

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – The United Arab Emirates are on the way to vaccinate half of its population against the coronavirus before a deadline it set itself in late March, according to the country’s health authorities.

The little desert sheikh of 10 million began delivering its vaccination campaign to the public late last year after making China’s Sinopharm vaccine available to frontline health workers and government officials in September. In terms of vaccination rates, the UAE’s national program is the second highest in the world after Israel.

More than 1.8 million people have already received the Sinopharm vaccine, which is available to all citizens and residents free of charge. That is more than four times the vaccination rate per capita in the US. The Pfizer BioNTech vaccine developed in the USA and Germany is launched in Dubai. He is currently in the first phase, which is reserved for people over the age of 60, existing health conditions and frontline workers.

A health worker shows a dose of the Chinese vaccine Sinopharm Covid-19 in a vaccination center in the Jordanian capital Amman on January 13, 2021.

Khalil Mazraawi | AFP | Getty Images

Both vaccines require two shocks 28 days apart, and 28 days after receiving the second shot, patients are no longer required to be quarantined but are required to continue wearing masks and practicing social distancing, as the country’s national emergency crisis and disaster management agency does did said

And while taking the vaccine is optional, it is highly recommended, according to NCEMA. Government employees in Abu Dhabi who choose not to take any of the vaccines are required to do a PCR test every two weeks.

“We are very pleased with the progress we have made,” UAE deputy minister for culture and public diplomacy Omar Ghobash told CNBC’s Hadley Gamble on Sunday. “Of course there are people who still get sick and sadly die, but overall we think we’ve managed to strike a balance between health and safety on the one hand and economic viability on the other.”

Sinopharm developers say the vaccine is 86% effective while the Pfizer / BioNTech vaccine is 95% effective, although some health professionals have expressed skepticism about the Chinese-made vaccine as there is no published data on its development and its Studies are available. In November, UAE leaders including the ruler of Dubai Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum tweeted pictures of themselves receiving the Sinopharm shot.

The vaccinations progress below the peaks in some cases

Since late December, cases in Gulf Land have risen in less than three weeks as tourists flocked to Dubai’s fully open beaches, restaurants and shopping malls. Although visitors may require a negative PCR test result before boarding or upon arrival, many suspect that a transmissible strain of virus, first identified in the UK, is at least partly to blame for the large number of British tourists staying in the emirate on vacation.

The spike in cases – now averaging more than 3,000 a day compared to around 1,000 a day in late December – led the UK to remove the UAE from its “safe travel corridor” despite UK travelers being excluded from many countries for fear of the new strain of the virus . The UAE had successfully kept their case numbers below 2,000 per day for all of 2020.

The UAE has recorded 256,732 confirmed cases of the coronavirus and 751 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University. A record number of 3,453 cases was recorded on Sunday.

Women sunbathers sit on a beach in the Gulf emirate of Dubai on July 24, 2020, while the Burj al-Arab Hotel can be seen behind it. After a painful four-month hiatus in tourism that ended in early July, Dubai is paying off as a safe travel destination with the resources to ward off coronaviruses.

KARIM SAHIB | AFP via Getty Images

Still, it seems that the party city and regional trade capital Dubai will continue their vaccination campaign, at least for the time being, while keeping their tourism-dependent economy open.

The neighboring oil-rich capital Abu Dhabi was now much more conservative and required a series of negative PCR test results over a period of several days for anyone wishing to enter the emirate – including from other emirates in the country.

In Dubai, the wearing of masks is still required in all public places, with the exception of activities such as eating or doing strenuous exercise. The authorities remind residents of social distance. The emirate’s openness, which has gradually increased since the summer, was due to one of the strictest lockdowns in the world in March and April.

Until the New Year, the Dubai government allowed residents to hold gatherings of up to 30 people in their homes. Hotels that were once almost empty now have an occupancy rate of over 70% as tourists flee their own countries for reasons of normalcy and warm weather.

“You balance personal responsibility with an economy that needs to move forward,” Ghobash said of the country.

“Vaccinate the largest percentage of society possible” is the country’s goal, NCEMA tweeted earlier this month, to “gain access to vaccine-acquired immunity that will help reduce the number of cases and control the disease” .

Employees working on a dry-type transformer production line at a power generation factory in Haian, east China’s Jiangsu Province, Jan. 4, 2021.

Stringer | AFP | Getty Images

BEIJING – China reported GDP rose 2.3% over the past year as the world battled to contain the coronavirus pandemic.

Gross domestic product grew 6.5% year over year in the fourth quarter, official data from the National Bureau of Statistics showed.

However, Chinese consumers continued to be reluctant to spend as retail sales fell 3.9% over the year. Retail sales increased 4.6% year over year in the fourth quarter.

The online sales of consumer goods rose relatively quickly by 14.8% in the past year, the statistics office announced, but the share of total retail sales remained relatively constant at around a quarter.

Economists expected China to be the only major economy to have grown over the past year and forecast GDP growth of just over 2%.

Covid-19 first appeared in the Chinese city of Wuhan at the end of 2019. To control the virus, Chinese authorities closed more than half the country and the economy contracted 6.8% in the first three months of 2020.

However, China returned to growth in the second quarter. Economists polled by Reuters forecast GDP to grow 6.1% in the fourth quarter, faster than the 4.9% pace in the previous quarter.

China’s GDP growth this year is expected to come from a lower base.

In late December, the National Bureau of Statistics cut China’s official growth rate for 2019 to 6.0% from the 6.1% previously reported. The cut came mostly in manufacturing as factories dealt with new US tariffs on Chinese goods valued at billions of dollars.

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A patient arrives at 28 de Agosto Hospital in Manaus, Amazonas, Brazil on January 14, 2021 amid the novel coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic. Manaus faces a lack of oxygen and sleeping places as the city has been overrun by a second surge in COVID-19 cases and deaths.

MICHAEL DANTAS | AFP | Getty Images

LONDON – A new variant of coronavirus identified in Brazil has heightened concern among public health experts, leading to warnings that more new strains are likely to emerge.

The news of the variant in Brazil comes after two separate mutant strains of the virus were discovered in the UK and South Africa earlier this year.

Researchers are urgently investigating the variants of Covid that are believed to have similar characteristics in order to better understand the threat they pose.

Viruses mutate naturally, and there is no evidence that the newly discovered strains have more serious disease outcomes.

However, the Covid variants are believed to be more transmissible than the original variant that triggered the pandemic, and this could lead to higher numbers of serious infections and additional deaths.

Health officials have recommended washing hands, physically distancing yourself, and using personal protective equipment to prevent the virus from spreading.

What is known about the variant found in Brazil?

Earlier this month, the Japanese National Institute of Infectious Diseases (NIID) announced that it had discovered a new variant of Covid in four travelers from the Brazilian state of Amazonas on January 2.

A man in his forties who was found to be asymptomatic when he arrived in Japan was hospitalized because his breathing condition was deteriorating. A woman in her thirties reported a sore throat and headache, a man between 10 and 19 years of age had a fever, and a young woman over 10 was asymptomatic.

This variant of the virus belongs to the strain B.1.1.248 and, according to the NIID, has 12 mutations in the spike protein. Spike proteins are used by the virus to enter cells in the body.

On January 14, 2021, nurses chatting outside 28 de Agosto Hospital in Manaus, Amazonas, Brazil amid the novel coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic.

MICHAEL DANTAS | AFP | Getty Images

NIID said it was difficult to immediately determine how contagious the new strain is and how effective vaccines against it are.

To date, Brazil has registered more than 8.3 million Covid cases and 207,000 virus deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University. The South American country is the second largest country for Covid-related deaths worldwide after the US.

Travel ban

The UK on Friday imposed a ban on travelers from South America (and Portugal and Cape Verde) to deter people from bringing the new variant into the country.

The country’s Secretary of Transportation, Grant Shapps, told the BBC this was a precautionary measure. He added that scientists believe the coronavirus vaccines will work on the new variant.

“We looked very closely at this particular mutation, unlike many other thousands, and realized that there might be a problem, not so much that the vaccine isn’t working. In fact, scientists believe it will work, just the fact is more spreadable, “said Shapps, according to Reuters.

On Thursday, British chief advisor Patrick Vallance told ITV that there was a “slightly greater risk” of the vaccine’s effectiveness with regard to the Covid variant identified in Brazil.

What about the mutant strains in the UK and South Africa?

On December 14th, the UK health authorities reported a variant to the WHO identified as SARS-CoV-2 VOC 202012/01. It is unclear how the new strain came about, but preliminary results have shown that it is highly infectious.

It originally appeared in the south east of England, but has since been the dominant variety in much of the UK and has spread to more than 50 other countries. Numerous nations then imposed bans on travelers from Great Britain.

Healthcare professionals wearing personal protective equipment (PPE) enter a makeshift ward devoted to treating possible COVID-19 coronavirus patients at the Steve Biko Academic Hospital in Pretoria on January 11, 2021.

Phill Magakoe | AFP | Getty Images

Independently of this, the national authorities in South Africa announced the detection of variant 501Y.V2 on December 18. Preliminary studies have shown that variant 501Y.V2 also increases portability. It has since reportedly been found in at least 20 other countries.

The variants that emerged separately both share a genetic mutation in the spike protein.

What happens next?

Studies are currently ongoing to understand the transferability and severity of the newly discovered variants of Covid, as well as their possible effects on vaccines.

After approximately 10 months of relative inactivity, “we have seen a remarkable evolution of SARS-CoV-2 with a repeated evolutionary pattern in the worrying SARS-CoV-2 variants from the UK, South Africa and Brazil.” Dr. Trevor Bedford, a virologist and associate professor at the University of Washington, said Thursday via Twitter.

Bedford, who also works with Fred Hutch’s vaccines and infectious diseases division, warned that the hypothesis was “highly speculative” at the time. “But separately, the fact that we’ve seen three worrying variants since September suggests that more are likely to follow.”

To date, more than 93.2 million people worldwide have contracted Covid-19 with 1.99 million deaths.

Professor Devi Sridhar, Chair of Global Public Health at the University of Edinburgh, said on Friday the world has “become the playground of the virus to mutate and develop (especially) in countries that have allowed higher prevalence”.

Several Democratic governors have criticized the Trump administration for apparently misleading public health officials for keeping a stash of Covid-19 vaccines in reserve.

Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said Tuesday that the government would begin releasing vaccine doses that are being held in “physical reserves” to ensure adequate supplies for second doses.

Both Pfizer and Moderna federally approved vaccines are given in two shots, several weeks apart.

The Washington Post reported Friday that despite Azar’s statements, there is no such nationwide vaccine supply. Quoting state and federal officials, the newspaper said the Trump administration began shipping its available offer back in December.

Democratic leaders say the lack of a Federal Reserve will mess up plans to increase the speed and scope of their vaccination campaigns.

“Last night I received disturbing news backed up straight to me by General Perna of Operation Warp Speed: The states will not receive increased vaccine supplies from national inventory next week because there is no federal reserve dose,” said Oregon Gov. Kate Brown wrote about General Gus Perna, Chief Operating Officer of Operation Warp Speed, in a post on Twitter.

“This is a national deception,” Brown added. “Oregon’s seniors, teachers, and we all had to rely on the promise that Oregon’s share of the Federal Reserve of vaccines would be given to us.”

Washington Democratic Governor Jay Inslee also took to the platform and said the government “must respond immediately for this deception”.

“I am shocked that we have been lied to and that there is no national reserve,” Colorado Democrat Jared Polis wrote on Twitter.

He said the federal inventory release announcement “resulted in us expecting 210,000 cans next week” and that other governors had made similar plans.

“Now we’re finding out we’re only getting 79,000 next week,” Polis wrote.

Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, a Democrat, said at a press conference that “they lied,” referring to the federal government.

Walz and democratic governments. Michigan’s Gretchen Whitmer and Wisconsin’s Tony Evers said in a joint statement on Friday: “It has become abundantly clear that not only has the Trump administration botched adoption of the safe and effective COVID-19 vaccine, but the American people as well was misled by these delays. “

The governors requested permission to buy vaccines directly from the manufacturers.

“Without additional shipping or direct purchase approval, our states could be forced to abandon plans in the coming weeks for public vaccination clinics that are expected to vaccinate tens of thousands. It is time for the Trump administration to do the right thing and help us end this Pandemic, “wrote the governors.

Azar responded to the governors in a thread on Twitter on Saturday, describing their claims as “completely misleading” and “devaluation”.

“We had a supply of reserved second doses as of December. We started releasing these second doses in late December so people could get their second doses. We have progressed this release gradually,” wrote Azar.

The HHS chief said the announcement this week was “that we will be releasing the remaining reserved second doses according to the cadence set – to make sure the second doses are available at the correct interval – and that we have no reserves in the future would. ” second cans. “

“The efforts of some governors to mislead the American people into distraction from their own distribution errors are deplorable,” Azar said, citing data showing that Michigan, Oregon and Wisconsin had not yet given the bulk of the vaccines already distributed in those states .

The Trump administration has grappled with Democratic civil servants since the Covid-19 crisis began, initially for delivering tests and other medical equipment and more recently for distributing vaccines.

President-elect Joe Biden, who will be inaugurated on Wednesday, has pledged to strengthen the federal government’s role in vaccine delivery. Biden has pledged to give 100 million vaccine doses in his first 100 days in office.

So far, vaccination efforts have lagged far behind official predictions. About 12 million doses have been administered, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Health officials had hoped to bring that number to 20 million by January.

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Alex Azar, Secretary for Health and Human Services, at the White House in Washington, DC on August 23, 2020.

Pete Marovich | Getty Images

Minister of Health and Human Services Alex Azar will step down on January 20, the day President-elect Joe Biden is sworn in.

In his January 12 resignation letter, Azar shot a farewell shot at President Donald Trump and mentioned last week’s US Capitol riot that saw a violent crowd of Trump’s supporters break through the building, injuring dozens of police officers and causing five deaths.

Azar wrote that “post-election actions and rhetoric, particularly last week, threatened to tarnish the legacy of this government”. “The attacks on the Capitol were an attack on our democracy and on the tradition of peaceful power transfers that the United States first brought into the world.”

Azar’s resignation came after U.S. Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao and several other Trump administration officials resigned after the president was accused of inciting the violence by instructing protesters to go to the U.S. Capitol, where the legislature finally determined Biden’s victory. The mob descended on the Capitol shortly after the trial began on Wednesday to count the votes of the electoral college and confirm Biden’s election.

“Given the pandemic, the ongoing need to deliver vaccines and therapeutics to the American people, and the need to ensure a smooth transition to the Biden administration, I have found it is in the best interests of the people we serve as Secretary until the end of the term, “said Azar in his letter to Trump.

“I ask you to continue to unequivocally condemn all forms of violence, to demand that no one attempt to disrupt the opening activities in Washington or elsewhere, and to continue to give your unreserved support to the peaceful and orderly transfer of power on January 20, 2021.”

In a tweet last week, Azar condemned the riot, saying he was “disgusted”.

“Physical violence and the desecration of this sacred symbol of our democracy must come to an end. People must disperse immediately and peacefully,” he said on Twitter.

Trump selected Azar, a former pharma executive, to head the U.S. agency in late 2017, replacing Trump’s first HHS boss, Dr. Tom Price. His department is responsible for overseeing extensive Medicare and Medicaid programs, as well as US public health, medical research, and food and drug safety. He was an integral part of the government’s Covid-19 response.

Prior to joining, Azar was General Counsel to the division from 2001 to 2005 and Assistant Secretary from 2005 to 2007. From 2012 to 2017 he was President of Lilly USA, the American arm of drug giant Eli Lilly.

Azar’s resignation comes amid a one-off pandemic. The US currently has more than 23.33 million cases of coronavirus and has by far the most virus deaths, with more than 389,000 confirmed deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University.

Federal and state officials are trying to distribute vaccines to prevent Covid-19 and end the pandemic.

Azar highlighted his efforts to lead his department during an “unprecedented pandemic”.

“Because of my leadership in pandemic flu preparedness during my previous tenure at HHS and subsequent experience in the private sector, we have formed a historic partnership with the Department of Defense, our scientists, and the pharmaceutical industry to bring therapeutics and vaccines to Americans Record time, “wrote Azar. “Operation Warp Speed ​​has achieved in nine months what many doubted it would be possible in a year and a half or more. From that date, two safe and effective vaccines will be given to millions of Americans, with more vaccines likely to be approved shortly We have two safe and effective therapeutics that can help keep the vulnerable out of our hospitals, with more therapies on the way … As we mourn for every life lost, our early, aggressive, and extensive efforts have saved hundreds of thousands or even millions of American life. “

President-elect Joe Biden plans to work with FEMA and the National Guard to establish coronavirus vaccination clinics in the United States. This emerges from new details of his vaccination schedule for Covid-19 released on Friday by his transition team.

Read Azar’s full resignation letter below:

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President-elect Joe Biden plans to work with FEMA and the National Guard to establish coronavirus vaccination clinics in the United States. This emerges from new details of his vaccination schedule for Covid-19 released on Friday by his transition team.

The Biden administration will also “quickly get underway” efforts to make vaccines available at local pharmacies in the US to ensure Americans have access to doses in facilities just miles from their homes as per the plan are away.

“Here’s the deal: the more people we vaccinate, the faster we do it, the sooner we can save lives and leave this pandemic behind and get back to our lives and loved ones,” Biden said in a speech in Wilmington, Delaware. Thursday night. “We’re not going to come out overnight and we can’t do it as a separate nation.”

Drug chains and pharmacies should play a bigger role in distributing the vaccine once the government expanded access to more people. But the slower than expected rollout has frustrated pharmacy chains. The National Association of Chain Drug Stores earlier this week called on the federal government to allow states to send more doses directly to pharmacies than hospitals and health departments do.

The group estimated that the country’s retail pharmacies could deliver at least 100 million doses of vaccines each month, surpassing the incoming government’s promise of 100 million shots in 100 days.

The Biden administration said current vaccination efforts are insufficient to vaccinate the vast majority of the US population quickly and fairly, adding, “We need to make sure local people have what they need to get vaccinations to get into people’s arms. “

The pace of vaccination in the US is much slower than officials hoped. More than 31.1 million doses of vaccine had been distributed in the U.S. as of 6 a.m. ET Friday, but just over 12.2 million vaccinations had been given, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The cases are now increasing rapidly. The United States records at least 238,800 new Covid-19 cases and at least 3,310 virus-related deaths every day, based on a seven-day average calculated by CNBC using data from Johns Hopkins University.

“We are staying in a very dark winter,” said Biden during a speech on Friday. “Almost a year later, we are still a long way from going back to normal. The honest truth is, things get worse before they get better,” he said. He called the vaccine rollout in the US a “failure”.

According to the plan, Biden will also apply the Defense Production Act to “maximize vaccine production and vaccine supplies for the country.”

The new president’s advisors had previously indicated that he would be invoking the wartime manufacturing law, which allows the president to force companies to prioritize manufacturing for national security in order to bolster vaccine production.

“The policy changes we are going to make will take some time to show up in the Covid statistics. It’s not just statistics, it’s people’s lives,” Biden said on Friday.

The plan says the law will increase the supply of necessary equipment that could otherwise lead to bottlenecks in the introduction of the vaccine if that shortage exists, including vials, syringes, stoppers and needles. It will also increase the capacity to vial the vaccines.

Biden’s plan will also encourage states to open eligibility beyond health workers and residents and long-term care facility workers to include key frontline workers such as teachers, first responders, grocery store workers, and anyone age 65 and over.

The CDC issued new guidelines on Tuesday extending eligibility for coronavirus vaccines to anyone aged 65 and over, as well as those with comorbid conditions such as diabetes. About 53 million Americans aged 65 and over and 110 million people between the ages of 16 and 64 with comorbid conditions can now get the vaccine if every state adopts the guidelines, according to the CDC.

“It does not mean that everyone in these groups will be vaccinated immediately because the care is not where it needs to be,” wrote the transition team. “But it will mean that once vaccines are available, they will reach more people who need them.”

Biden said the government also plans to launch a public information campaign to “rebuild that confidence” as some polls indicate Americans are skeptical about getting a Covid-19 vaccine.

“We will help people understand what science is telling us. That the vaccines can reduce the risk of Covid infections and better protect our health and the health of our families and our communities,” said the president-elect.

“Our plan is as clear as it is brave,” he added. Let more people vaccinate for free, create more places to get vaccinated, mobilize more medical teams to get the shots in people’s arms, increase the supply and get it out the door ASAP . This will be one of the most challenging operations our country has ever undertaken, but you have my word. We’re going to make hell out of this operation. “

A health worker shows a dose of the Chinese vaccine Sinopharm Covid-19 in a vaccination center in the Jordanian capital Amman on January 13, 2021.

Khalil Mazraawi | AFP | Getty Images

BEIJING – Sinopharm, a state-owned giant in coronavirus vaccine development in China, announced that its chairman resigned from the board on Tuesday.

The company cited personal reasons for Li Zhiming’s resignation, according to a release made for the Hong Kong-listed company. Li Hui, a member of the board of directors and the audit committee of Sinopharm subsidiary China National Medicines Corp., also resigned Tuesday for personal reasons.

In late December, Chinese authorities approved a vaccine being developed for general launch by a Beijing-based subsidiary of Sinopharm. According to state media, the vaccine had a 79.34% effectiveness after a Phase 3 test.

In early December, the United Arab Emirates said the vaccine was 86% effective.

There was no direct indication that the resignation was due to vaccination work. The company did not immediately respond to CNBC’s email request for comment.

Different countries have published different results on the effectiveness of a coronavirus vaccine from another Chinese company, Sinovac.

A WHO team is working with manufacturers of Covid-19 vaccines from Chinese pharmaceutical companies Sinovac and Sinopharm “to assess compliance with international quality manufacturing practices prior to a possible emergency listing by the WHO,” said WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus earlier this week.

Boxes containing the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine are prepared for shipment at the McKesson distribution center in Olive Branch, Mississippi, United States, on December 20, 2020.

Paul Sancya | Reuters

The Biden government’s plan to release virtually every available dose of Pfizer and Moderna’s coronavirus vaccines to states shouldn’t cause supply problems later, a member of President-elect Joe Biden’s Covid-19 advisory board said Thursday.

The advisory team has had numerous discussions with vaccine manufacturers Pfizer, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson, including about supply issues, said Dr. Celine Gounder, who sits on the panel and is an infectious disease specialist at NYU’s Grossman School of Medicine.

Aside from unforeseen “Snafu products”, the Biden government is “confident” that there will be no problem getting people to get their second shots on time, she said.

“We’re not too worried about that,” Gounder told the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health during a webcast on Thursday afternoon. “If you look at the production schedule, they’re going to be releasing more and more doses over time, so things really open up significantly.”

Gounder’s comment comes hours before Biden announces his plan to vaccinate the U.S. population and end the pandemic that killed at least 385,503 Americans in almost a year. Criticizing the Trump administration’s strategy of introducing vaccines, Biden said at the current pace, “It will be years, not months, for the American people to be vaccinated.”

The pace of vaccination in the US is much slower than officials had hoped. As of 9:00 a.m. ET on Wednesday, more than 29.3 million vaccine doses had been distributed in the United States, but just over 10.2 million vaccinations had been given, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The number is a far cry from the federal government’s goal of vaccinating 20 million Americans by the end of 2020 and 50 million Americans by the end of this month.

Some state governors, including New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, have complained about the availability of vaccines, stating that the lack of doses has affected their ability to vaccinate people.

The Trump administration on Tuesday passed Biden’s plan to release most of the doses it had withheld for the second round of recording of Pfizer’s and Moderna’s two-dose vaccines.

General Gustave Perna, who oversees the logistics for President Donald Trump’s vaccination program, Operation Warp Speed, had previously said the provision of replacement doses of Covid was “good planning for the Army Officer General” to ensure the right people are available can get the shots if necessary.

To speed up the pace of vaccinations, the Trump administration also changed the way vaccine doses are assigned to states, and the CDC expanded vaccination eligibility to include anyone aged 65 and over, as well as those with comorbid conditions such as diabetes and heart disease.

Some public health experts have questioned whether companies can make more cans before people need their second shots.

Gounder said Thursday that the government still plans to hold “a small buffer” of cans in reserve.

“We’ll publish almost all of them [doses] with a little buffer left because we want to speed up the pace of vaccinations, “she said.” This is really a decision on how to manage care. It is not a recommendation about vaccine dose or schedule. “

Bangalore Airport employees transfer cardboard boxes of vials of Covishield vaccine developed by the Serum Institute of India on January 12, 2021 in Bangalore, India.

Stringer | Xinhua | Getty Images

SINGAPORE – India is preparing for one of the largest mass vaccination exercises in the world starting Saturday.

The South Asian country plans to vaccinate around 300 million people, or more than 20% of its 1.3 billion population, against Covid-19 in the first phase of the exercise.

Indian airlines have started delivering the first doses of vaccine to Delhi and other major cities, including Kolkata, Ahmedabad and the Bengaluru Technology Center. The Minister of Civil Aviation, Hardeep Singh Puri, announced earlier this week.

Priority for the recordings is given to healthcare and other frontline workers – an estimated 30 million people. That would be followed by people over the age of 50 and other younger people at high risk.

The rollout will involve close cooperation between the central government and the states.

India has also developed a digital portal called Co-WIN Vaccine Delivery Management System. According to the Ministry of Health, real-time information on “vaccine stocks, their storage temperature and individual tracking of the beneficiaries” is provided.

India has a long history of vaccination campaigns … and will rely on this expertise in spreading coronavirus vaccines.

“India’s vaccine manufacturing expertise and experience with mass vaccination campaigns have prepared it well for the Phase 1 vaccinations scheduled to begin this weekend,” Akhil Bery, South Asia analyst with Eurasia Group, wrote in this week a report.

“India has a long history of vaccination campaigns, including its universal immunization program that vaccinates 55 million a year, and will rely on that expertise in distributing coronavirus vaccines,” he added.

Emergency approval

The Indian Medicines Agency has approved the restricted use of two coronavirus vaccines in emergency situations, both of which will be delivered to the various vaccination centers before Saturday.

One of them is a vaccine developed by the Anglo-Swedish company AstraZeneca and Oxford University, made domestically by the Serum Institute of India (SII) and known locally as Covishield.

Another vaccine was called Covaxin Developed domestically by India’s Bharat Biotech in collaboration with the Indian State Medical Research Council. Emergency clearance has been granted as clinical trials continue.

Covaxin’s approval has reportedly been criticized by some after the regulator gave the green light shortly after asking Bharat Biotech for further analysis.

India’s Minister of Health said Tuesday the Indian government had signed procurement agreements for 11 million doses of Covishield at Indian rupees 200 ($ 2.74) per dose and 5.5 million doses of Covaxin at an average cost of Rs 206 per shot, which is likely cheaper than what it will cost in the private market.

Several other candidates, including a second domestically developed vaccine from Zydus Cadila, are currently in clinical testing.

Possible risks

India currently has more than 10.5 million reported coronavirus cases, second only to the US. According to the Johns Hopkins University, more than 151,000 people have died of Covid-19 in India. However, figures reported daily show that the number of cases of active infections is decreasing.

South Asia’s largest country is also the world’s largest manufacturer of vaccines and is believed to produce about 60% of all vaccines sold worldwide.

As a result, India’s production of Covid vaccines is expected to play an important role in global immunization against the disease.

Eurasia Group’s Bery said that despite the government’s optimism, two major risks could potentially slow the launch of the vaccination campaign.

“First, vaccine production capacity will be limited even in best-case scenarios,” he said, adding that if local vaccine manufacturers cannot produce the 600 million doses needed to vaccinate the first 300 million people, “India’s vaccination schedule – and the export of vaccines to other countries could be significantly delayed. “

The second risk is that India’s vaccination campaign is highly dependent on state governments, “whose capacities and expertise vary widely,” Bery said. “Effective coordination between the central government and the state government is required, which has not been (Prime Minister Narendra) Modi’s strength.”

Dr. Dan Ponticiello (43) and Dr. Gabriel Gomez, 40, intubate a patient with coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in the COVID-19 intensive care unit at the Providence Mission Hospital in Mission Viejo, California on January 8, 2021.

Lucy Nicholson | Reuters

A record 4,327 people died of Covid-19 in the United States on Tuesday. This was the deadliest day of the pandemic as the federal government is trying to accelerate the adoption of life-saving vaccines. Ohio researchers say they found two new variants that likely originated in the United States

The new record marks the second time in the last week that Covid-19 deaths have exceeded 4,000 in one day. According to a CNBC analysis of data compiled by Johns Hopkins University, the weekly average number of deaths per day climbs to 3,342 – a 26% increase from the previous week.

So far, 34,804 people have died in January to become the deadliest month of the pandemic in the United States. Medical experts say the nation is on an upswing after the vacation and the situation is likely to get worse before it improves.

The U.S. has reported more than 22.8 million Covid-19 cases since the pandemic began, and cases are increasing daily in most states. As of Tuesday, the average number of new cases in the past week in 36 states and Washington, DC rose at least 5%

“We were in a bad place even before the real holidays hit us,” said White House health advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci, on Tuesday during the Schmidt Futures’ Forum on Preparedness.

“We’re in a very difficult situation and it’s getting worse,” said Fauci. “I hope we will see a high point and a turning point towards the end of January, especially if people stay there and don’t get discouraged by Covid-19 fatigue and let their public health actions down.”

The record Covid-19 deaths came as the Trump administration – just a week before President-elect Joe Biden took office – tries to accelerate the spread of Pfizer and Moderna coronavirus vaccines.

Researchers in Ohio say that one of the two new varieties they discovered quickly became the dominant strain in Columbus, Ohio over a three-week period in late December and early January.

Like the strain first detected in the UK, the US mutations appear to make Covid-19 more contagious, but this is not expected to affect the effectiveness of the vaccines, the researchers said.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is reviewing research on the new strains.

The CDC on Tuesday issued new guidelines extending vaccine eligibility to all over 65s as well as those with comorbid conditions such as diabetes and heart disease.

US officials said they would also stop withholding millions of doses reserved for the second round of two-dose vaccinations. So far, most states have focused on vaccinating health workers and nursing home residents, but that has left a backlog of people waiting to get the shots.

The US has distributed more than 27.6 million vaccine doses but only given about 9.4 million shots, according to the CDC. Fauci said the federal government was “a bit too rigid” in restricting starting doses to just a small group of people and doses not being dispensed as efficiently as they could have been.

“That has changed,” said Fauci. “At the moment we are not going to give up prioritization, but when people are ready to get vaccinated, we will go straight to the next level so that no vaccine doses sit in a freezer or refrigerator where they could end up in people’s arms.”

New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy told CNBC’s Squawk Box on Wednesday that hospitals in his state are asking to vaccinate people beyond their healthcare workers. The governor told CNBC that New Jersey will likely allow 65 years and older to sign up for vaccinations in the coming days, although this has not been officially announced.

“We have already worked towards that goal, and the blessings of the CDC, the deep support of the Biden administration for this, all of these things come together. And we will be taking that step shortly,” said Murphy.

New York governor Andrew Cuomo said Tuesday his state would follow CDC’s new guidelines. As of now, residents 65 and over can try to get vaccinated, he said, but urged patience as supply is likely to lag far behind demand.

“So you’re telling people today, ‘You’re eligible,’ but you’re also telling people, ‘We don’t have enough doses to reach you for the next six months,'” Cuomo said during a press conference Tuesday. “Is that helpful? I think not. I think it creates more frustration and more fear.”

– CNBC’s Nate Rattner, Will Feuer and Berkeley Lovelace Jr. contributed to this report.