US surgeon general warns unvaccinated people are at risk from a potentially more dangerous Covid-19 variant https://www.cnn.com/2021/06/10/health/us-coronavirus-thursday/index.html As a renewed sense of optimism sweeps the US this summer with lower reported Covid-19 cases, the US Surgeon General has issued a warning for those not vaccinated: don't let your guard down quite yet. "For those who are unvaccinated, they are increasingly at risk as more and more variants develop," Surgeon General Vivek Murthy told CNN's Chris Cuomo on Wednesday, specifically citing the B.1.617.2, or Delta variant, first identified in India. "The news about the Delta variant is evidence of really why it's so important for us to get vaccinated as soon as possible," he said, adding that the variant is more transmissible and potentially more dangerous. Concern over the risk of variants bringing an end to a nationwide reopening is shared by many health experts and officials. Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, noted in an interview with CNN that the United Kingdom was earlier stricken with the B.1.1.7, or Alpha, variant before Delta infections became predominant. "We don't want to let happen in the United States what is happening currently in the UK, where you have a troublesome variant essentially taking over as the dominant variant, which has made it a very difficult situation in the UK," he said on Wednesday, adding that the Delta variant accounts for more than 6% of sequenced virus in the US. While the US has "done very well" with vaccinating its population, Fauci said, "we cannot declare victory prematurely because there are still a substantial proportion of people who have not been vaccinated." Another vaccine could soon be available to adolescents: On Thursday, Moderna announced in a statement it had asked the US Food and Drug Administration to authorize its Covid-19 vaccine for emergency use in 12- to 17-year-olds. The vaccine is currently authorized for people 18 and older. "We are pleased to announce that we have submitted for an emergency use authorization for our COVID-19 vaccine with the FDA for use in adolescents in the United States," said Stéphane Bancel, Moderna's CEO. "We are encouraged that the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine was highly effective at preventing COVID-19 and SARS-CoV-2 infection in adolescents." Meantime, vaccination rates throughout the country are continuing at an uneven pace. Recent CDC data shows that eight states have fully vaccinated more than half of their residents: Connecticut, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Rhode Island and Vermont, which leads the country with nearly 60% of residents fully vaccinated. Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee and Wyoming have among the lowest vaccination rates in the country, according to CDC data. And officials are urging citizens that the best way to get ahead of the variants is with vaccinations. Murthy told CNN, "The good news is that when they looked at the Pfizer vaccine, they found that it was quite effective after two doses at protecting against even the Delta variant." States are looking ahead In another example of local optimism with improved Covid-19 numbers, about two dozen states have decided to scale back their daily tracking of cases, hospitalizations and deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University this week. Many states have scaled back to five updates each week, but others have dropped to three times or less. Florida, for example, has dropped to once per week. Some health officials, however, are calling this move premature in the face of current vaccination rates, citing needed improvement in these areas before states can let off the gas pedal regarding Covid-19. "As far as I know, we're still in a public health emergency as a country ... That has not been downgraded yet," Lori Tremmel Freeman, chief executive officer of the National Association of County and City Health Officials, told CNN on Wednesday. "An ultimate goal is to get to the point where even those who remain unvaccinated are at far less risk -- and nobody that I know has really landed on that number," Freeman said about herd immunity. This week, several states across the country also announced plans to further loosen their Covid-19 protocols. South Carolina lifted an emergency order placed on the state, touting what Gov. Henry McMaster called the "timid" approach the state took to closures and restrictions. "It is no longer necessary to have a state of emergency, although it is still necessary for us to be smart, to follow the rules, to follow the guidelines and be very careful," McMaster said. In New York, the state plans to lift "virtually all" pandemic-related restrictions when 70% of adults have received at least one dose of the vaccine, Gov. Andrew Cuomo's office said in a press release Wednesday. The state is currently at 69.1%, according to the release. Expiring vaccines are a new concern With the lag in vaccinaton rates, some states report they have Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine doses that are expiring before they get used. "There were state health officials that have been sounding the alarm for months now, that they were soon going to reach the point where supply exceeds demand in these states," CNN medical analyst Dr. Leana Wen said Wednesday. The seven-day average of vaccines administered daily in the US was more than 1.12 million, a slight increase from earlier in June yet far lower than the peak average of 3.38 million shots per day reached on April 13, according to Wednesday's CDC data. For Johnson & Johnson vaccines remaining in the US, which only require one dose when distributed and have a three-month shelf life at refrigerator temperatures, lowered demand means that doses are going unused and may soon expire. Nearly 11 million doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine -- about half of the 21.4 million doses that have been delivered to states and other jurisdictions -- have not been administered, according to data from the CDC. Potentially expiring coronavirus vaccines make up 1-2% of vaccines distributed to states, a source familiar with the federal vaccination effort told CNN Wednesday. Dr. Fauci said Wednesday that the US Food & Drug Administration is "very, very carefully" looking into extending shelf life or re-allocating Johnson & Johnson vaccines that are set to expire. Speaking during the Wall Street Journal Tech Health event on Wednesday, Johnson & Johnson Chairman and CEO Alex Gorsky said the company is working to ensure its vaccines can be used and deployed effectively. "We're working very hard, both at the federal level at the local level, to do everything we can to make sure that these vaccines can be used and deployed in the very best possible way," Gorsky said. "The good news was we got a lot of vaccines out to meet this initial surge in demand and now making sure we get the very best possible deployment and allocation and the distribution system gets even more agile, more flexible, not only here in the United States, between states, but in fact around the world will be work that we need to continue to stay focused on in the weeks and months ahead," he said.
COVID-19: Delta variant about 60% more transmissible than Alpha and more resistant to vaccines, PHE reports The number of new Delta variant cases has increased by more than 240% in the past week. https://news.sky.com/story/covid-19...re-resistant-to-vaccines-phe-reports-12330068 Undervaccinated red states are nowhere near herd immunity as dangerous Delta variant spreads https://news.yahoo.com/undervaccina...angerous-delta-variant-spreads-090052183.html Southern states have a ‘real vulnerability’ to Delta Covid variant this summer, warns Dr. Peter Hotez https://www.cnbc.com/2021/06/11/cov...-vulnerable-to-delta-variant-this-summer.html
Study Shows 96% of Doctors Have Been Vaccinated for Covid https://www.nbcmiami.com/news/local...ctors-have-been-vaccinated-for-covid/2473566/ Remember the long lines to get the COVID-19 vaccine? When the vaccines first became available to the public, demand overwhelmed the supply. Now, demand has virtually disappeared, and doctors are trying to persuade patients to get vaccinated. They might have a new tool to help them convince people to roll up their sleeves: a new study by the American Medical Association shows more than 96% of physicians have been vaccinated. The study surveyed 300 physicians nationwide, in a wide variety of specialties. "There’s no reason a physician would go and get vaccinated if they didn’t think that it was gonna help protect them,” said Dr. Marc Napp, the chief medical officer of the Memorial Health Care System. Dr. Napp said the survey shows the public that if doctors are willing to get vaccinated, the bizarre conspiracies out there about the vaccines are simply not true. "Physicians at their heart are scientists, they believe in the science, and they understand that there’s a tremendous amount of rigor that goes into developing and testing a vaccine, or any medication for that matter, and they wouldn’t put something in their own body that they didn’t think was safe and effective,” Dr. Napp said. Throughout the pandemic, primary care physicians have been on the front lines of the fight against Covid. Dr. Cesar Corretjer-Russi strongly recommends all of his patients get vaccinated, but said he regularly runs into misinformation and outright lies. “Someone who read five minutes in Wikipedia something and now you’re an expert,” Dr. Corretjer-Russi said, shaking his head. “A person actually listen more to gossip than regular doctors.” Dr. Napp said in order to persuade patients, doctors have to address their individual concerns about the Covid vaccines. “But without beating people over the head, somebody who has deeply held fear or deeply held distrust, you’re not gonna get past that just by saying listen, the vaccine’s safe, the vaccine’s effective,” Dr. Napp explained. Dr. Corretjer-Russi agrees and said with vaccine-reluctant patients, he uses himself as an example. “We put ourselves in the line, showing you that this works,” he said.
Looks like womp-womper news for Cure-Vac. Although I do buy into the idea that it could also just be a dosing issue. Not exactly sure why we need more vaccines unless they offer something new and different. The Novovax is a different method which creates the spike in advance has the spike in vaccine rather than the rna/dna code to produce it. And this allows it to mix and match spikes needed to counter all serious variants and to easily update and develop into an annual all-variant vaccine. So I can see a company such as Novovax coming in late and still having a place in the market because they are doing something different and meeting a foreseeable need. Not sure what Cure-Vac brings to the party. Maybe a low cost vaccine that is not Russian or Chinese. Not sure. That is supposed to be what the AstraZ vaccine was going to do for europe but people are getting uppity over some problems and India is sucking up all the vaccine. Germany’s CureVac COVID-19 vaccine flops in clinical trial https://www.foxnews.com/health/germanys-curevac-covid19-vaccine-flops-in-clinical-trial