New—Germany's vaccine commission has approved the use of the Oxford-AstraZeneca jab for age>65. Recent studies now enough data to approve it for all ages. "new data also shows that the vaccine is even more effective when [doses 12 weeks apart]. 🧵 #COVID19 bbc.com/news/world-eur…
2) And indeed, the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine seems on par with Pfizer in mass vaccination studies. Not too shabby. economist.com/graphic-detail…
3) Here I walk people they the data on the 12 weeks being the best time gap between 1st and 2nd shot of the Oxford vaccine. That said 12 weeks has not been tested for Pfizer or Moderna ones.
4) Meanwhile, I love the J&J vaccine. It has a lot of great properties of no freezing and single dose, but its efficacy grows over time, matching and possibly exceeding some others for severe disease.
HORRIFYING #COVID19 death curve in one of wealthiest cities in Brazil— Porto Alegre is capital of Rio Grande do Sul— with many top-notch hospitals with better rating than most US🏥. And their health system still collapsed under #P1.
📍STARK WARNING—“Whatever #SARSCoV2 variants summit that peak could be a considerably bigger problem than any variants that we know”—with “any combinations of increased transmissibility, altered virulence and/or ⬆️ capacity to escape population immunity.” medrxiv.org/content/10.110…
2) “The emergence & rapid rise in prevalence of three independent #SARSCoV2 '501Y lineages' #B117#B1351#P1 has prompted renewed concerns about the evolutionarily capacity to adapt to both rising population immunity and public health interventions such as vaccines & distancing.”
3) “Viruses giving rise to 501Y lineages have, presumably under intense natural selection following a shift in host environment, independently acquired multiple unique & convergent mutations. As a consequence all have gained properties that likely complicate control of #COVID19.”
💡EFFECTIVE—Single-dose Oxford–AstraZeneca #COVID19 vaccine followed by a 12-week booster. Vaccine efficacy was significantly higher at 81·3% after two standard doses given at an interval of >=12 weeks, versus 55·1% when doses <6 weeks apart. Good news! 🧵 thelancet.com/journals/lance…
2) “findings were supported by immunogenicity studies done in participants who were younger than 55 years, showing anti-SARS-CoV-2 spike IgG antibody responses more than two-fold higher in those who had a dose interval of >=12 weeks than in those who had an interval of <6 weeks”
3) “Notably, efficacy against any nucleic acid amplification test-positive cases, including symptomatic and asymptomatic or unknown cases, was 63·9% (46·0 to 75·9) after a single standard dose, suggesting the possibility of reducing viral transmission.”
JAPAN 🇯🇵 WARNS OF POTENTIAL “FOURTH WAVE”—Over 230 cases of highly infectious variant strains of the novel coronavirus have been confirmed in in Japan. Experts warning of a potential "fourth wave" should they continue to spread across the country. #COVID19 english.kyodonews.net/news/2021/03/0…
2) Here is one of the new Japan outbreaks of #B117 —linked to a school for kids under 10. This matches a lot of other trends on elevated B117 risk in kids.
This is the most worrisome article on anti-vaxxer movement in a long time. It’s so insane... it makes my blood boil how prevalent science denialism is in evangelical community. And it’s hurting pandemic mitigation. #COVID19 google.com/amp/s/www.wash…
2) “on TikTok, young Christians act out biblically inspired scenes in which they are forced to take a vaccine, only to end up splattered in fake blood and on the brink of death—to represent how the introduction of coronavirus vaccines could herald the biblical End Time.”
3) “Along with hundreds of thousands of other vaccine-questioning posts by social media users all over the world, they’re demonstrating the ways in which health misinformation is targeting Christians, some reaching sizable audiences.