"Scarlet Letter L" fueled by COVID vaccine defiance + delta variant taking shape across conservative strongholds in the South. It began in Missouri, descended into Arkansas Louisiana and is now reaching East across the Gulf Coast states of Mississippi, Alabama, North Florida

With some exceptions, starting this summer almost no one in the US has to be hospitalized from COVID-19 or lose their life from SARS-2 coronavirus. By now almost all (>90-95%) of the hospitalizations and deaths from COVID-19 in America are by choice. That is the reality.

And the bad guys in this are not the victims of COVID-19. The bad guys = members of the US Congress who sought to discredit vaccines this past weekend, and the cable news outlets, weaponizing health communication and falsely claiming vaccines = political instruments of control.

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Prof Peter Hotez MD PhD

@PeterHotez

11 Jul

@Christi_Paul

Many thanks ⁦@Christi_Paul⁩ for hosting me ⁦@NewDay⁩ Sunday, as we watch the delta variant spread from Missouri and Arkansas into the Deep South where vaccination coverage is low. We’re going to lots of hospitalizations and long-haul COVID19 in the coming weeks

@medrxivpreprint

Regarding long haul COVID19 or PASC I’ve been flagging this @medrxivpreprint from @UniofOxford looking at grey matter brain 🧠 degenerative disease following COVID19 affecting some areas that resemble cognitive decline in aging or even Alzheimer’s medrxiv.org/content/10.110…

Remember, COVID19 PASC is not rare, up to 10-30% of recovering Covid patients. We’re learning that the SARS-2 coronavirus is a neurotropic virus. So when those seeking to downplay Covid quote low mortality rates among young people, I say, hey that’s just the tip of the iceberg

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Prof Peter Hotez MD PhD

@PeterHotez

10 Jul

https://twitter.com/DrEricDing/status/1413931514954489860

This is just beginning in the US, starting with the state of Missouri. But if the US goes the same direction as Europe, many unvaccinated people in the US South (and elsewhere where vaccination coverage is low) should expect to become infected with delta COVID19 in the coming wks

https://twitter.com/DrEricDing/status/1413931514954489860

I mean, what about this makes the far right in America 🇺🇸 think this will go well here? What do they think is going to happen this summer in low vaccine coverage areas of the South?

Making my "wish list" now of specific individuals I would like to meet in person and plead with them to get behind vaccinating the South, Mountain West and other vulnerable areas of the country asap....here goes:

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Prof Peter Hotez MD PhD

@PeterHotez

10 Jul

@andersoncooper

Many thanks ⁦@andersoncooper⁩ for hosting me @AC360 tonight. I’ve been saying that eventually we’ll likely need a 3rd mRNA immunization to further increase virus neutralizing antibodies and cellular immunity to provide more robust protection and resilience against variants

But the publicly available evidence that protection is waning vs delta variant as per Pfizer PR not strong, and evidence from UK elsewhere also indicates pretty robust immunity. So while yes we will eventually need a 3rd immunization based on current data may not be necessary now

Also not clear to me why we would do a booster through an EUA mechanism? There is urgency to get the 3 current US COVID19 vaccines through the full approval mechanism, and then the booster through traditional processes. Otherwise we risk eroding public confidence

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Prof Peter Hotez MD PhD

@PeterHotez

8 Jul

This might make sense but EUA is not a slam dunk. Evidence that protective efficacy really wanes based on limited and variable studies, and virus neutralizing ab levels don’t tell us what’s happening with memory cells. Also there’s the global equity issue apnews.com/article/europe…

So I recognize that a 3rd immunization would really crank up VNA and that’s a good thing for resilience to the variants of concern, but there will other considerations. It will be interesting to see if FDA says yes or will require a full on study for the EUA.

It would also be good to look at whether we could achieve more durable protection using a prime boost approach with our recombinant protein vaccine? In other words 2 doses of Pfizer followed by ours. But so far not much interest from the United States

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