The latest claims from Russia. Unfortunately none of these claims are bearing out in reality outside of Russia when Sputtik is used. Russia's Sputnik V vaccine 97.6% effective in real-world study: Scientist https://www.straitstimes.com/world/...e-976-effective-in-real-world-study-scientist MOSCOW (BLOOMBERG, REUTERS) - An analysis of the 3.8 million Russians who received both Sputnik V shots between December and March showed that the vaccine has 97.6 per cent efficacy, the inoculation's state-run developers said in a statement on Monday (April 19). The data, which compare the infection rate of people who received the shots with the incidence among the unvaccinated population, will be published in a peer-reviewed journal in May, according to the Russian Direct Investment Fund and Gamaleya National Research Centre. The new effectiveness rate is higher than the 91.6 per cent rate outlined in results from a large-scale trial of Sputnik V and published in The Lancet medical journal earlier this year. Using a database of people who received both doses of the vaccine, scientists at Moscow's Gamaleya Institute, which developed it, calculated a real-world effectiveness rate of 97.6 per cent, according to Russian scientist Denis Logunov, a lead developer of the Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine, during a presentation for the Russian Academy of Sciences. The high efficacy will be welcomed by the World Health Organization (WHO), which is working "very intensely" with Russian and Chinese authorities to get their vaccines pre-qualified, director Hans Kluge said in Belgrade after a meeting with Serbia's health minister. "In order to get out of the pandemic, we need to accelerate vaccination. We need to increase the production capacity and to expand the portfolio of vaccines," Mr Kluge said.
We did it': Biden celebrates U.S. hitting 200-million-dose milestone in his first 100 days As the U.S. reached Biden’s goal of administering 200 million shots this week, vaccine supply is starting to outstrip demand in some areas. Even without the supply of Johnson & Johnson vaccine, which is undergoing a safety review, the U.S. has been shipping out more doses than are being used in recent weeks, a senior administration official told reporters on Wednesday. The U.S. had administered 199,426,628 as of April 21, according to an NBC News tracker, well on pace with eight days remaining to reach his goal for the first 100 days. Biden said the country is entering a new phase in its vaccination efforts as it starts to shift its focus from getting the vaccine to those most at risk to the general population. "The time is now to open up a new phase of this historic vaccination effort," Biden said. "To put it simply, if you've been waiting for your turn, wait no longer. Now's the time for everyone over 16 years of age to get vaccinated." https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/whi...stone-n1264782
Vaccinated people would not have to wear masks in some situations... Biden expected to announce updated mask guidance on Tuesday https://thehill.com/policy/healthca...-to-announce-updated-mask-guidance-on-tuesday President Biden is expected to announce on Tuesday updated guidance on masking from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), two sources confirmed to The Hill. The guidance is still being finalized, according to multiple sources, but is likely to ease recommendations that Americans wear masks even while outdoors. Biden is expected to outline the changes in a speech on Tuesday more broadly addressing where the country stands in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic. CNN reported the announcement will focus on whether vaccinated people need to wear masks when outdoors. The CDC did not respond to a request for comment. Anthony Fauci, Biden's top medical adviser and the government's leading infectious diseases expert, hinted in an interview Sunday that updated guidance on masks was in the works. "I think it's pretty common sense now that outdoor risk is really, really quite low, particularly — I mean, if you are a vaccinated person, wearing a mask outdoors, I mean, obviously, the risk is minuscule," Fauci said on ABC's "This Week." "What I believe you're going to be hearing, what the country is going to be hearing soon is updated guidelines from the CDC," he added. "The CDC is a science-based organization. They don't want to make any guidelines unless they look at the data, and the data backs it up." Studies have consistently found the risk of transmitting COVID-19 is significantly reduced when outdoors, particularly when individuals are socially distanced. Experts have increasingly questioned the need for mask use outdoors given the rising percentage of Americans who are vaccinated against the virus. Washington, D.C., New Jersey, Massachusetts and Virginia are among several states that have some type of mandate requiring residents to wear masks when outdoors. Multiple sources wondered if the loosening of masking guidance will make much difference in the immediate future, with one suggesting it may be "too little too late." A handful of states have already lifted mask mandates, and some Americans have already stopped wearing masks outdoors as the weather warms.
I see. They are just getting around to seriously looking at the data. Translation: The data coming out of Joe's focus groups is telling them to get real and knock off the bullshit and that if you want people to get vaccinations then you have to show them some increased freedom along with it, after over a year of shaming the shiite out of people. Frigging Dr. Science Fauxci was telling us just a few weeks ago that two masks outside is the way to go. Of course he had no "science" on that either but if anything he pulls out of his arse is supposed to be directly from the mouth of God.
How the US went from having one of the worst Covid responses to being a global leader in vaccinations under Biden https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/26/politics/biden-100-days-covid/index.html For the last 100 days, President Joe Biden and his top advisers have mounted an urgent, wartime effort to get millions of coronavirus vaccines into the arms of Americans in order to beat back a pandemic that has upended the world for the better part of year. The effort, described to CNN during in-depth interviews with three of the administration's top Covid advisers and two other White House officials, has allowed the US to go from having one of the worst Covid responses in the world to being a global leader in getting shots in arms. The interviews reveal how the Biden team inherited a pandemic at its zenith with a high demand for vaccines and little supply, along with no long-term plan to vaccinate millions of Americans. The President, at times impatient, pressed his advisers harder on ways to improve the federal government's response to the virus. Fully aware that success or failure in getting Americans vaccinated would make or break his presidency, Biden and his team set vaccination goals and jump started the federal response to meet them, deploying active-duty military and the Federal Emergency Management Agency to help with vaccinations, establishing a federal pharmacy program and funding community health centers, all to increase vaccine access. And the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan helped fund the vaccination effort too. According to the White House, there are now 70,000 sites around the country where people can get vaccines. "From day one, it's been about urgency, overwhelm the problem, we're at war with the virus," said Jeff Zients, the White House Covid-19 response coordinator, in an interview with CNN's Gloria Borger. When Biden came into office, the country was experiencing about 3,000 deaths and hundreds of thousands of new cases per day, only about 15 million people were vaccinated and there was a scarce supply of shots. To turn it around, Biden's team brought a fresh urgency and a desire to lean on the scientific experts who had been ignored so much in the previous year. Ever since January 20, there has been a dispute between current administration officials and ones from the last over exactly what plans for vaccine distribution the Trump administration had left its successor. "There was no plan to get shots into arms," Zients told CNN. "Those early doses of Moderna and Pfizer were being drop-shipped to states." The Trump team disputes that there was no long-term plan, saying they handed the Biden administration the playbook. "I have to say it's frustrating when they spend all of their time disparaging what we did. They say we didn't have a plan. We had 65 plans," said Paul Mango, a former Trump administration official who helped oversee the operation. He says their approach gave local leaders more control because of the administration's belief that they understood their communities better than the federal government ever could. But the nation's top infectious disease specialist -- who once disputed that the Biden team was starting from scratch -- now says that the Biden team deserves credit for the current state of the vaccine roll out. "There was not really a well-articulated, long-range playbook to get the vast majority of the people vaccinated," Dr. Anthony Fauci told CNN. "That's where I think the full-court press of the Biden administration really, really stepped up to the plate and did it well." 'He's impatient' The administration points to Biden's pressure as a major reason for the quick ramp-up. "He's impatient," Fauci said of the President. "He asks specific questions, 'Well, what about this? Why aren't we doing this? Are we doing the best in that?' In a non-confrontative way, but more of a way that's positively trying to get the best out of everybody." The President set the goalposts -- starting with the promise of 100 million shots in the first 100 days. Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, a Republican, said that was a low bar. "We were already doing more than a million a day at that point. So, if he did absolutely nothing, we would have done 100 million in, in the first 100 days, even if he didn't show up," Hogan said. But Biden met that goal on day 58 and upped the ante -- doubling the target to 200 million shots in 100 days, and then exceeding that number as well. He personally announced new Covid milestones, like the purchase of an additional 200 million doses from Pfizer and Moderna, the emergency use authorization for the one-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine and a partnership between J&J and rival company Merck to speed up manufacturing. All along the way, he set markers to explain to the American people what these announcements meant in terms of when shots would be available. First there would be enough vaccine supply for all Americans by the end of July, then the end of May. All adults would be eligible for a vaccine by May 1, then April 19. After months of waiting, appointments for vaccines are becoming more and more available. "We have to always start with access, making sure that people can get vaccinated in places where they are comfortable and where they trust the people who are vaccinating them," says Dr. Marcella Nunez-Smith, chair of the White House Covid-19 Equity Task Force. There were setbacks along the way, like ice storms in February that delayed vaccines shipments just as supply was increasing. In April, the Food and Drug Administration and US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended temporarily pausing use of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine after rare, one-in-a-million, cases of blood clots were found. The Biden team insisted this would not affect their supply or vaccination targets, and the vaccine is now back in use. But the pause did cause some initial confusion, and there were worries that it may increase vaccine hesitancy among those who were already unsure. Fauci said the takeaway for those worried about safety should be the opposite. "If they pulled the trigger on something as rare as one in a million, you should think that these guys and ladies out there that are making this decision, they're taking safety very seriously. When you say something is really safe, they mean it's really safe," he said. Next up: Fighting vaccine hesitancy In 100 days, the US has gone from being heavily criticized for its Covid-19 response -- with over 570,000 recorded deaths, the highest number in the world -- to the envy of the world on vaccinations, with an inoculation rate more than four times the global average. But the country is now at a tipping point. With vaccine supply secured, it's now set to outpace demand at a critical moment, with Covid-19 variants on the rise. And the Biden administration's success or failure in reaching the hesitant and convincing everyone to take the vaccine will be critical in determining whether the country can finally win the war against the virus and move forward. The administration insisted it would always lead with the science, but the science has often moved too slowly for a public eager to get back to normal. Some critics have said the Biden team should have put out earlier guidance about travel and socializing after vaccination, as an incentive to get the shot. "I don't think that people understand what's in it for them," said Dr. Leana Wen, an emergency physician and visiting professor at George Washington University who is a CNN medical analyst. Wen said she also thinks the administration should have prioritized teachers for vaccination earlier in order to help schools open sooner. More than half of adults in the US have now had at least one dose of the Covid-19 vaccine, but reaching the second half may be much harder. Hesitancy remains a huge hurdle to reaching herd immunity, as vaccination numbers are starting to decline. Some communities of color are skeptical, vaccinations in rural areas are lagging and half of Republican men say they won't take the vaccine. "It's absolutely crazy," Hogan said of vaccine hesitancy among Republicans. "The only way we ever get life back to normal is if we get enough people to get that vaccine." With all American adults now eligible for a shot, the country has reached a new phase of the vaccination effort: A massive PR campaign on social media, on TV and radio and in newspapers that enlists celebrities, politicians, doctors and local community leaders to tout the benefits and safety of the vaccine, and urge people to sign up. "We always have to make sure that messages are tailored," Nunez-Smith said. "So that's about saying, what are your particular concerns? What misinformation often, and disinformation have you heard? And how can we debunk that?"