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Vaccine antibodies against Covid-19 could be lost in just three months

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) — As we’ve said on many occasions, medical knowledge about the novel coronavirus and the COVID-19 disease it causes is a rapidly evolving science with new and sometimes contradictory studies coming out almost daily. There’s encouraging news about a British vaccine and a new study from Mt. Sinai that supports the vaccine report. Researchers are having promising results with an experimental vaccine being developed by the University of Oxford and the pharmaceutical company Astrazeneca. The study in the Lancet looked at more than 1,000 healthy adults and found the vaccine induced strong antibody and other immune responses. “What this vaccine does particularly well is trigger both arms of the immune system. So in addition to neutralizing antibodies, which other vaccines do, we also see a very strong T-Cell response,” said professor Adrian Hill, Director of the Jenner Institute at Oxford University. That means that both antibodies that can neutralize the COVID-19 virus were produced, as well as T-Cells, which are the primary killers of virus infected cells.

The response lasted at least two months after they were immunized.

In a separate study, researchers at New York’s Mt. Sinai found that more than 90% of infected individuals with mild to moderate COVID-19 make high levels of neutralizing antibodies against the coronavirus and that antibody levels remain high for at least three months.

While these findings will still have to be squared with previous contradictory studies, they are encouraging signs. Oxford and its pharma partner Astrazeneca are proceeding with 10,000 volunteer trails in the UK, South Africa and Brazil.

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Cuomo threatens to close ALL New York bars and restaurants

If ‘stupid’ crowds and business owners continue to ignore social distancing rules despite hospitalizations reaching their lowest since March 18

  • Bars and restaurants in New York City can service people on an outdoor basis
  • But Cuomo said on Monday too many were ignoring social distancing rules
  • Large crowds continue to gather at some bars, and the NYPD is refusing to intervene
  • Cuomo said he’d roll back the reopening and close all bars if it continues
  • The hospitality industry was crippled by the 14-week closure
  • Many were put out of business entirely and others are open but can’t pay rent
  • The infection rate among those tested in NYC is now 1.3% and Brooklyn and Manhattan have the lowest rates
  • Hospitalizations are down to their lowest across NY state – 716 – since March 18

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has threatened to reverse New York City’s reopening plan and close all bars and restaurants because too many are allowing large groups to gather. The infection rate of people tested in New York City is now just 1.3 percent, with Brooklyn (0.9 percent) and Manhattan (1.1 percent) showing lower numbers than any other borough. Statewide, hospitalizations have fallen to their lowest since March 18 – 716 – and the three-day average of the number of people dying every day is now 11. Despite the encouraging numbers, Cuomo says there are still too many young people, particularly in the city, flouting social distancing rules. They are ‘reckless and stupid’, he said, but the bar and restaurant owners who are allowing them to gather and the cops who are turning a blind eye to them are also to blame. Bars and restaurants in New York City were finally allowed to offer outdoor service on June 22 after an excruciating, 14-week closure that crippled the economy and put many out of business. Indoor dining is indefinitely postponed, due in part to the huge surge in cases being seen in other states where it was allowed to resume. On Monday, Cuomo warned: ‘We cannot allow those congregations to continue. ‘If it happens… I’ll tell you what’s going to happen. ‘We will have to roll back the bar and restaurant opening if the congregations continue, if the local governments don’t stop it, that is what is going to happen. ‘One plus one still equals two,’ he said. He showed photos of crowds at bars in Astoria, Queens, and on the Lower East Side as examples, but large gatherings have been seen all over the city. Statewide: 1.05% positive of 49,342 people tested positive (519). Bars and restaurants were allowed to resume outdoor dining on June 22. Many had been offering take-out throughout the pandemic which created a problem of people gathering in streets with drinks. Last week, Cuomo tightened the rules.

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US leads the World In Infections, New cases and DEATHS

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The crisis that shocked the world: America’s response to the coronavirus

Six months after the coronavirus appeared in America, the nation has failed spectacularly to contain it. The country’s ineffective response has shocked observers around the planet. Many countries have rigorously driven infection rates nearly to zero. In the United States, coronavirus transmission is out of control. The national response is fragmented, shot through with political rancor and culture-war divisiveness. Testing shortcomings that revealed themselves in March have become acute in July, with week-long waits for results leaving the country blind to real-time virus spread and rendering contact tracing nearly irrelevant.

a close up of a map © Provided by The Washington Post

The United States may be heading toward a new spasm of wrenching economic shutdowns or to another massive spike in preventable deaths from covid-19 — or both.

How the world’s richest country got into this dismal situation is a complicated tale that exposes the flaws and fissures in a nation long proud of its ability to meet cataclysmic challenges. The fumbling of the virus was not a fluke: The American coronavirus fiasco has exposed the country’s incoherent leadership, self-defeating political polarization, a lack of investment in public health, and persistent socioeconomic and racial inequities that have left millions of people vulnerable to disease and death.In this big, sprawling, demographically and culturally diverse nation, the decentralized political structures gave birth to patchwork policies that don’t make sense when applied to a virus that ignores state boundaries and city limits.

While other countries endured some of the same setbacks, few have suffered from all of them simultaneously and catastrophically. If there was a mistake to be made in this pandemic, America has made it.

The single biggest miscalculation was rushing to reopen the economy while the virus was still spreading at high rates through much of the country, experts say. The only way to reopen safely, epidemiologists said as far back as early April, was to “crush the curve” — to drive down the rate of viral transmission to the point that new infections were few and far between. Many countries did just that. The United States did not follow the expert advice. Now, the curve is crushing America. “We didn’t have the stick-to-itiveness, the determination, to carry through what we started in March, April and May, and now the virus is taking advantage of that,” National Institutes of Health Director Francis Collins said. “If we’d had really strong guidance from local, state and national leaders, maybe we could have sustained the determination to get the curve all the way down to zero,” he said. “Now, we’re on the upswing, and I don’t quite see the top of the upswing yet.” Other countries have managed to avoid the kind of dramatic viral resurgence that is happening in America. Spain, Italy, Germany and France — all devastated by the virus months ago — drove coronavirus cases and deaths to relatively low levels. The United Kingdom has been an outlier in Europe, with one of the highest per capita death tolls in the world, but after suppressing transmission, it has not seen a major rebound. And in Asia, the picture is radically different. In Taiwan, baseball fans sit in the stands and watch their teams play. Japan has had fewer than 1,000 deaths from covid-19, the illness caused by the coronavirus. South Korea has had fewer than 300. Vietnam has recorded no deaths from the virus. The death rate from covid-19 in the United States looks like that of countries with vastly lower wealth, health-care resources and technological infrastructure.

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Brain fog, fatigue, breathlessness

Rehab centers set up across Europe to treat long-term effects of coronavirus

https://youtu.be/WMiXs0R_gEI

Professional diver Emiliano Pescarolo contracted coronavirus in March and spent 17 days in hospital in the Italian port city of Genoa before being discharged on April 10. Now, three months later, the 42-year-old still experiences breathing difficulties. “Once back home, even after weeks I couldn’t see any progress: if I took a small walk, it was like climbing Mount Everest. I was out of breath also just for talking. I was very worried,” he said. For much of Europe, the peak of Covid-19 infections has passed. But while hospitals are no longer awash with acute cases, there are thousands of people who had either confirmed or suspected Covid and, weeks or months later, say they are far from fully recovered. In the United Kingdom, communities of “long Covid” sufferers have spring up online, as people try to manage what appear to be long-term effects of a virus about which much remains unknown. Meanwhile, health authorities in the UK and Italy, two of the European nations worst hit by the coronavirus pandemic, are starting to offer rehabilitation services to Covid-19 survivors. These will likely need to be wide-ranging, since research now indicates that coronavirus is a multi-system disease that can damage not only the lungs, but the kidneys, liver, heart, brain and nervous system, skin and gastrointestinal tract. Dr Piero Clavario, director of the post-Covid rehab institute attended by Pescarolo in Genoa, said his team had started contacting several hundred Covid-survivors treated by hospitals in the district in May. Of those, they have now visited more than 50. “They are not only those that were in ICU and intubated because of Covid, but also patients that spent not more than three days in the hospitals and then went home,” he said. “We investigate aspects that escape standard virological and pulmonary exams.” Of the 55 people visited by his team, eight needed no follow-up support and had no complications, Clavario said. “Fifty percent have psychological problems, 15% PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder).” Each patient is given two half-day evaluations involving multiple tests by a team of doctors, cardiologists, neurologists, psychologists and physicians, Clavario said.

“What surprises me the most is that even the patients that have not spent any time in the ICU are extremely feeble: there is no evidence of a cardiological or pulmonary problem, but they are not even able to walk up a flight of stairs,” he said. “Most show a serious muscle weakness. A 52-year-old nurse had to go back to work after having recovered from Covid, but she just couldn’t physically make it. While some people were treated in hospital, others struggled through their illness at home. Many are not formally confirmed as having had Covid-19 despite their symptoms. In some cases, they were unable to get a test because of a lack of capacity in the early weeks of the virus’ rampage through the UK, even for frontline health care workers. Others had a test but it came back negative. Earlier this month, Hancock announced a major study into the long-term health effects of Covid-19 on patients who were hospitalized. The study, known as PHOSP-COVID, aims to track 10,000 people over the next 12 months or longer. The UK’s National Health Service also plans to set up an online platform to support Covid sufferers in their recovery and, in late May, opened a new rehabilitation center in southern England, the NHS Seacole Centre in Surrey, to help those most seriously affected. Other hospitals are also starting to offer rehabilitation services. In some people, their may be severe enough that they need long-term management in hospital, he said. But even in less severe cases, “it’s going to impact their ability to work, certainly to work in the way that they did before, it will affect their relationships, it will affect people who care for them, where their roles are going to have to change, where there was previously someone who was fit and well and now has a chronic condition.”

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US breaks daily record for Coronavirus….AGAIn

  • The U.S. reported more than 70,000 new coronavirus infections for second day in a row, as of Saturday.
  • New cases are increasing in nearly all 50 states.
  • 19 states hit their own record highs in average daily new cases.

The U.S. reported 71,558 new Covid-19 cases Saturday, making it the second day in a row the nation seen more than 70,000 new infections, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. As of Saturday, average daily new cases have increased 18.34% nationwide compared to one week ago, according to a CNBC analysis of Johns Hopkins’ data. The U.S. leads the world in reported cases with a total of 3.66 million total since Covid-19 hit. To date, 139,480 deaths from the virus have been reported in the U.S., the most fatalities of any nation in the world. Nineteen states hit their own record highs in average daily new cases, with most seeing a more than 25% increase. As nearly all 50 states see increases in new cases, hospitalizations are growing in 33 states with 14 states hitting record highs in average current hospitalizations. Florida and Texas each reported more than 10,000 new cases Saturday, according to data from their state health departments. Twelve percent of Floridians tested for the virus came back positive, down from a recent high of 18%. More than 17% of Texans tested came back positive for the virus as of Thursday.

Texas and Florida are major centers of the coronavirus outbreak in the U.S. The virus has surged since the spring after states in the Sunbelt started rapidly reopening their economies after brief lockdowns. Last Sunday, Florida reported more than 15,000 new cases, higher than New York at its peak of 10,824 new cases on April 9.

Deaths are also trending upward in several states. Arizona, Florida and Texas saw average daily fatalities from the virus increase more than 50% to record highs, according to CNBC’s analysis of Johns Hopkins’ data. South Carolina saw average daily fatalities increase more than 22% to a new record for the state. FEMA is sending 18 refrigerated trucks to act as temporary mortuaries in Texas as the state orders more body bags in preparation for a spike in deaths. The U.S. hit a nationwide record for new cases on Thursday, with 77,255 new cases. White House health advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci on Friday praised New York for its handling of the coronavirus pandemic, amid a debate in the U.S. about whether states where the virus is surging should revert to stricter lockdown measures. Governors in hotspot states like Arizona, Florida, Texas and Georgia have been reluctant to implement strict social distancing measures.

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Trump claims US has lowest COVID mortality rate

President Donald Trump insisted during an interview with Fox News Sunday that the U.S. has the “lowest mortality rate” from the novel coronavirus pandemic, even as anchor Chris Wallace fact-checked the claim, pointing out that the U.S. actually has one of the “worst” fatality rates. Trump has said multiple times over the past couple weeks that the U.S. has the “lowest” or “one of the lowest” mortality rates due to the pandemic. White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany has also made the claim, but the data available to the public does not support this assessment. Wallace confronted Trump over this fact during an interview aired Sunday morning.

“Sir, we have the seventh highest mortality rate in the world. Our mortality rate is higher than Brazil, it’s higher than Russia and the European Union has us on a travel ban,” the anchor told Trump during the interview.

The president responded by saying he believed it was the “opposite” of what Wallace had said. “I think we have one of the lowest mortality rates in the world,” Trump said.

https://youtu.be/_Ge5ErdK–M

“That’s not true, sir. We, we, we have a – we had 900 deaths on a single day…” Wallace replied. Trump then insisted that the data be checked, insisting that Wallace was wrong and suggesting he was “fake news.” Wallace said that the president could check the data, and said he did not believe he was “fake news.” “You said we had the worst mortality rate in the world … and we have the best,” Trump insisted. An analysis by Johns Hopkins University, which Wallace said was his reference, showed that the U.S. currently has the eighth highest observed case-fatality ratio of the countries most affected by the pandemic. It stood at seventh last week when the interview was filmed. That ratio shows the U.S. now has a 3.8 percent fatality rate. The U.S. fairs worse when looking at the number of deaths per 100,000 people. As of now, more than 42 people have died for every 100,000 people in the U.S. due to COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel virus. That’s the third highest number of the most affected countries. When compared to all countries, not just the most affected, the U.S. ranks 10th highest in terms of the number of deaths out of 100,000 people. Meanwhile, the number of new infections in the U.S. continues to surge as deaths are rising. The U.S. continues to be the country in the world with the highest number of confirmed cases and deaths – with more than 3.7 million infections and over 140,000 deaths. Trump told Wallace that he ultimately accepts responsibility for the U.S. response to the pandemic, but also suggested that some governors have done a poor job handling the situations in their respective states. “Look, I take responsibility always for everything because it’s ultimately my job, too. I have to get everybody in line,” the president said. “Some governors have done well, some governors have done poorly. They’re supposed to have supplies they didn’t have. I supplied everybody.”

Trump and Wallace
In this screengrab, President Donald Trump sits across from Fox News Sunday host Chris Wallace for an interview at the White House in Washington, D.C. broadcast on July 19 Fox News Sunday

The president’s insistence that the U.S. has one of the “lowest” fatality rates wasn’t the only disagreement he had with facts pointed out by Wallace during the interview. Trump also insisted falsely that his Democratic rival, former Vice President Joe Biden, has called for defunding or abolishing the police. While Biden has backed some reforms, he and most Democratic lawmakers have not supported the defunding movement. “And Biden wants to defund the police,” Trump said. Wallace replied: “Sir, he does not.” The president then became frustrated and said: “Look, he signed a charter with Bernie Sanders.” Wallace interrupted, pointing out that the charter “said nothing about defunding the police.” Trump then insisted a copy of the document be brought for review. As Wallace noted in a preview of the interview, the president found “a lot of things that he objected to” but there were not any mentions of defunding or abolishing the police.

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One Texas county says it’s had 85 babies less than 1 year old test positive for coronavirus

https://youtu.be/qjZvZAcHX1s

  • Nueces County, Texas officials say 85 babies under the age of one have tested positive for coronavirus.
  • Texas is experiencing a surge in coronavirus cases, and Nueces County has the fastest growth in new cases on average of any other metropolitan county, one official said.
  • 8,100 people have tested positive for coronavirus in Nueces County so far and 82 have died.

Officials from Nueces County in Texas are asking people to take care to curb the spread of COVID-19 as 85 children under the age of one have tested positive for the virus.

“We currently have 85 babies under the age of one year in Nueces County that have all tested positive for Covid-19,” said Annette Rodriguez, director of public health for Corpus Christi Nueces County.

Texas is experiencing a surge in coronavirus cases, and Nueces County, in particular, is seeing a spike. “Nueces County has the fastest growth in new cases on the seven-day average than any other metropolitan county in the state,” said Corpus Christi city manager Peter Zanoni. “You can see the trend line is relatively flat until July, and this is where we have had that huge spike in cases, and this is why it’s turned into a major problem for Nueces County,” he added. Thus far, Nueces County has had 8,100 people test positive for COVID-19, of which 82 have died. In July 2019 the county’s population stood at 362,000, per the US census. Texas’ coronavirus outbreak has worsened over the past several weeks. To date, Texas has had a total of 321,000 coronavirus cases and 3,889 deaths. Dr. Peter Hotez, the dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine, told Business Insider’s Rhea Mahbubani that Texas had “opened prematurely” when Gov. Greg Abbott decided to proceed with an “Open Texas” plan on May 1. Abbott has since halted reopening, as coronavirus cases and hospitalizations spiked in the state.

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31% of kids in Florida tested for COVID-19 are positive

Before pushing to reopen schools, consider how many Florida kids are testing positive for COVID-19

Health officials in Florida have started reporting a truly scary trend: They say 31.1 percent, or nearly one-third, of children in Florida who are tested for COVID-19 end up returning a positive result. With as many questions as we still have about how this virus affects children — and their role in spreading it to the adults we already know are vulnerable to more severe infections — this is pretty alarming, especially considering the national push to reopen schools in time for the fall semester, which is just weeks away in some states. State data from Florida shows that the 31.1 percent positivity rate is much higher than the overall statewide rate, which is around 11 percent. That means almost three times as many children who are tested are getting positive results than adults who are tested. That creates two main concerns for health officials: First, it shows that COVID-19 is spreading more rapidly among children than adults. And second, it creates huge fears because of how little we know about the virus’s long-term effects, especially in kids. There’s already evidence that COVID-19 causes lasting lung damage in adults, even if they don’t have severe cases.

“They are seeing there is damage to the lungs in these asymptomatic children. … We don’t know how that is going to manifest a year from now or two years from now,” Alina Alonso, the health department director of Palm Beach County, told reporters this week. “Is that child going to have chronic pulmonary problems or not?”