Discover and read the best of Twitter Threads about #B1352
Most recents (4)
DIFFERENCE A VARIANT CAN MAKE: Early in the Oxford-AstraZeneca’s South Africa 🇿🇦 trial, before #B1351 variant became dominant, the AZ vaccine had a great efficacy of 75% risk reduction of #COVID19 after a single dose! But all that disappeared once B1351 variant showed up... 🧵 
2) Notably, #B1351 variant showed up midway through the trial and soon became the dominant strain after early November. And because it had the worrisome E484K “Eeek” mutation that could evade neutralizing antibodies, it then completely flipped the AZ vaccine results...
3) Notably, notice how the early 75% early efficacy seen by the vaccine completely got flipped around and was no longer any better late in the trial! Resulting in a crap 22% non-significant efficacy.
Late trial, 95% of infections sequences were #B1351 according to other data.
Late trial, 95% of infections sequences were #B1351 according to other data.
⚠️TWO DIFFERENT #COVID19 PANDEMICS—Many think with cases dropping that pandemic is nearly over. But truth is, there are now 2 different #SARSCoV2 pandemics diverging—old strain is waning, while the more contagious #B117 strain is dominating. We will be soon slammed very hard. 🧵
2) Here is what is really going to happen... most countries are having a gentle case decline with R(e) currently around 0.9. But this is deceiving. The #B117 is still relatively rare so far, so the R is being influenced mostly by the old common variant. But not for long...
3) Here is what is going to happen... currently R is ~0.9 in many places, but with the more infectious #B117, the R will jump 50% approximately. And it is inevitable (all CDC and Danish models say this) that B117 will take over as the reigning dominant variant soon...
BREAKING—Novavax says its #COVID19 vaccine is 90% effective, but likely only 50% against the #B1351 variant found in South Africa.
50% better than 0%, but clearly we have challenges with the #B1351 mutation. UPDATES COMING.
nytimes.com/2021/01/28/hea…
50% better than 0%, but clearly we have challenges with the #B1351 mutation. UPDATES COMING.
nytimes.com/2021/01/28/hea…
2) SURPRISING—“Participants were infected with the variant even after they had already had Covid.” This aligns with what South Africa CDC warned last week
3) “we are the first to conduct an efficacy trial — in the face of a changing virus,” said Stanley Erck, CEO of Novavax. He said that researchers expected variants could change the trial results, but “the amount of change has been a bit of a surprise to everyone.”
BREAKING—First two community transmission cases of the worrisome #SARSCoV2 strain #B1351 first seen in South Africa 🇿🇦 have been detected in South Carolina. No travel history in either cases. #B1352 is the one seen to evade antibodies. #COVID19
cnn.com/2021/01/28/hea…
cnn.com/2021/01/28/hea…
2) The variant -- also known as B.1.351 -- has raised concerns over being more transmissible than other versions of the virus, and potentially evading the immune protection offered by antibodies. Experts say they believe vaccines will still be effective against the variant.
3) "The arrival of the SARS-CoV-2 variant in our state is an important reminder to all South Carolinians that the fight against this deadly virus is far from over," Dr. Brannon Traxler, the health department's interim public health director, said in a statement Thursday.
