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Research Particulars How Delta Variant Dodges Immune System

Study Details How Delta Variant Dodges Immune System

The delta variant of the coronavirus can evade antibodies that target specific parts of the virus, according to a new study published in Nature on Thursday. The results provide an explanation for the reduced effectiveness of the vaccines against Delta compared to other variants.

The variant first identified in India is believed to be about 60 percent more contagious than Alpha, the version of the virus that hit Britain and much of Europe earlier this year, and perhaps twice as contagious as the original coronavirus. The delta variant is now causing outbreaks among unvaccinated populations in countries like Malaysia, Portugal, Indonesia and Australia.

Delta is now also the dominant variant in the USA. Infections in the country have been at their lowest level since the pandemic began, although the numbers may rise. Still, hospital admissions and deaths related to the virus remain steep. That’s partly because of the relatively high vaccination rates: 48 percent of Americans are fully vaccinated and 55 percent have received at least one dose.

But the new study found that Delta was barely sensitive to a dose of the vaccine, confirming previous research suggesting the variant can partially bypass the immune system – albeit to a lesser extent than Beta, the variant first identified in South Africa.

French researchers tested how well antibodies produced by natural infections and by coronavirus vaccines neutralize the alpha, beta and delta variants, as well as a reference variant that is similar to the original version of the virus.

The researchers examined blood samples from 103 people infected with the coronavirus. Delta was much less sensitive than Alpha to samples from unvaccinated individuals in this group, the study found.

One dose of vaccine increased sensitivity significantly, suggesting that people who have recovered from Covid-19 may still need to be vaccinated to fight off some variants.

The team also analyzed samples from 59 people after receiving the first and second doses of the AstraZeneca or Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines.

Blood samples from just 10 percent of those immunized with a dose of the AstraZeneca or Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines were able to neutralize the Delta and Beta variants in laboratory tests. But a second dose increased that number to 95 percent. There was not much difference in the levels of antibodies produced by the two vaccines.

“A single dose of Pfizer or AstraZeneca was either poorly effective or not effective at all against beta and delta variants,” the researchers concluded. Data from Israel and the UK broadly support this finding, although these studies suggest that one dose of vaccine is still enough to prevent hospitalization or death from the virus.

According to the new study, the Delta variant also did not react to Bamlanivimab, the monoclonal antibody from Eli Lilly. Fortunately, three other monoclonal antibodies tested in the study retained their effectiveness against the variant.

In April, the US Food and Drug Administration revoked the emergency approval for the treatment of Covid-19 patients as a single treatment, citing the increase in variants resistant to bamlanivimab.

Separately, Pfizer announced Thursday that it is developing a version of its vaccine that targets the Delta variant and is expected to begin clinical trials in August.

The company also reported promising results from studies of people who received a third dose of the original vaccine. A booster given six months after the second dose increases the effectiveness of the antibodies against the original virus and beta variant by five to ten times, the company said in a press release.

Antibody levels could drop six months after immunization, Pfizer said, and booster doses may be needed to fight off variants. But antibodies aren’t the only part of the body’s immune response, and other studies have shown that the immunity induced by full vaccination is likely to remain robust against variants for years to come.

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Health

Pfizer and Moderna Vaccines Prone to Produce Lasting Immunity, Research Finds

Pfizer and Moderna Vaccines Likely to Produce Lasting Immunity, Study Finds

The vaccines from Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna trigger a sustained immune response in the body that can protect against the coronavirus for years, scientists reported on Monday.

The results add to the growing evidence that most people immunized with the mRNA vaccines may not need a booster dose as long as the virus and its variants do not progress much beyond their current forms – which is not guaranteed. People who have recovered from Covid-19 before they were vaccinated may not need a booster vaccination, even if the virus goes through a significant transformation.

“It’s a good sign of how persistent our immunity to this vaccine is,” said Ali Ellebedy, an immunologist at Washington University in St. Louis who led the study, which was published in the journal Nature.

The study did not take into account the coronavirus vaccine manufactured by Johnson & Johnson, but Dr. Ellebedy said he believed the immune response was less permanent than that of mRNA vaccines.

Dr. Ellebedy and colleagues reported last month that in people who survived Covid-19, immune cells that recognize the virus remain dormant in the bone marrow for at least eight months after infection. A study by another team showed that so-called memory B cells continue to mature and strengthen for at least a year after infection.

Based on these results, the researchers suggested that immunity in people infected with the coronavirus and later vaccinated could last for years, possibly a lifetime. However, it was unclear whether vaccination alone could have a similar long-lasting effect.

Dr. Ellebedy addressed this question by examining the source of memory cells: the lymph nodes, where immune cells train to recognize and fight the virus.

After an infection or vaccination, a specialized structure forms in the lymph nodes, the germinal center. This structure is sort of an elite school for B cells – a boot camp in which they become increasingly sophisticated and learn to recognize a multitude of viral genetic sequences.

The greater the range and the longer these cells have to practice, the more likely they are to thwart any virus variants that may appear.

“Everyone is always focused on developing the virus – this shows that the B cells are doing the same,” said Marion Pepper, an immunologist at the University of Washington in Seattle. “And it will protect against the continued development of the virus, which is really encouraging.”

After an infection with the coronavirus, the germinal center forms in the lungs. But after the vaccination, the cells are formed in the lymph nodes in the armpits that researchers can reach.

Updated

July 2, 2021, 5:06 p.m. ET

Dr. Ellebedy and colleagues recruited 41 people – including eight with a history of infection with the virus – who were immunized with two doses of the Pfizer BioNTech vaccine. The team collected lymph node samples from 14 of these people three, four, five, seven and 15 weeks after the first dose.

This meticulous work makes this a “heroic study,” said Akiko Iwasaki, an immunologist at Yale. “This kind of careful time history analysis in humans is very difficult.”

Dr. Ellebedy found that 15 weeks after the first dose of the vaccine, the germinal center was still highly active in all 14 participants and that the number of memory cells that recognized the coronavirus had not decreased.

“The fact that the reactions lasted almost four months after the vaccination – that’s a very, very good sign,” said Dr. Ellebedy. Sprouting centers typically peak one to two weeks after vaccination and then decrease.

“Usually there isn’t much left after four to six weeks,” said Deepta Bhattacharya, an immunologist at the University of Arizona. But germinal centers that are stimulated by the mRNA vaccines “still go in, months, and most people don’t go back much”.

Dr. Bhattacharya noted that most of what scientists know about the persistence of germinal centers is based on animal studies. The new study shows for the first time what happens to people after vaccination.

The results suggest that the vast majority of those vaccinated will be protected in the long term – at least against the existing coronavirus variants. But older adults, people with weak immune systems, and those taking drugs that suppress immunity may need boosters; People who survived Covid-19 and were later vaccinated may not need it at all.

It is difficult to predict exactly how long protection against mRNA vaccines will last. In the absence of variants that bypass immunity, immunity could theoretically last a lifetime, experts said. But the virus is clearly evolving.

“Anything that would actually require a refresher would be variant-based, not immunity waning,” said Dr. Bhattacharya. “I just don’t see it.”

People who have been infected with the coronavirus and then immunized see a sharp spike in their antibody levels, likely because their memory B cells – which produce antibodies – had many months to develop before vaccination.

The good news: a booster vaccine is likely to have the same effect on people who have been vaccinated as a previous infection, said Dr. Ellebedy. “If you give them another chance to get involved, they’ll have a massive response,” he said, referring to memory B cells.

In terms of boosting the immune system, vaccination is “probably better” than recovering from the actual infection, he said. Other studies have shown that the repertoire of memory B cells produced after vaccination is more diverse than that produced by infection, suggesting that the vaccines protect against variants better than natural immunity alone.

Dr. Ellebedy said the results also suggest that these signs of sustained immune response could be caused by mRNA vaccines alone, as opposed to those made by more traditional means like Johnson & Johnson’s.

But that’s an unfair comparison because the Johnson & Johnson vaccine is given as a single dose, said Dr. Iwasaki: “If the J&J had a booster, they might get the same kind of reaction.”

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World News

Biden infrastructure plan would minimize U.S. debt, add to GDP: Wharton research

Biden infrastructure plan would cut U.S. debt, add to GDP: Wharton study

U.S. President Joe Biden stops at La Crosse Municipal Transit Utility in La Crosse, Wisconsin, the United States, on Jan.

Kevin Lemarque | Reuters

A bipartisan infrastructure deal by President Joe Biden and a group of senators would not only help economic growth but also reduce national debt, according to a new study by the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School.

Wharton School researchers said the additional $ 579 billion in new infrastructure spending would increase domestic production by 0.1% and reduce US debt by 0.9% by 2050.

“Over time, as new spending declines, IRS enforcement continues, and revenue increases from increased production, national debt will decrease 0.4 percent from baseline, and 0.9 percent in 2040 and 2050, respectively “Wrote the Wharton team.

Speaking to CNBC Tuesday, Wharton’s chief economist Jon Huntley said that improvements in public capital (roads, bridges, and other physical infrastructure) make private capital (trucks and trains moving goods for businesses) more productive over time .

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Fewer potholes and disruptions in rail traffic add up to US economic activity over the years and encourage further private sector investment.

The projected increase in GDP and the simultaneous reduction in national debt, albeit modest, is likely welcome news for the Democrats and Republicans who brokered the deal with the White House.

The entire package, approved by the bipartisan senatorial group and the Biden administration, approves spending of $ 1.2 trillion over the next five years. The additional $ 579 billion includes more than $ 300 billion for transportation projects, while $ 266 billion would be allocated to investments in digital, disaster, environmental and energy infrastructure.

Biden is in the middle of a road show promoting the plan and told the Wisconsin crowds Tuesday that it will “change the world for families” in Badger State.

The deal will “ensure” [high speed broadband] is available in every American household, including the 35% of rural families who currently forego it, “he added. The president is expected to travel to Michigan this weekend to further praise the deal.

Still, Biden’s transnational mission to generate support for the measure underscores the fragility of even bipartisan efforts to repair the country’s transport infrastructure. The president himself nearly doomed the deal last week when he said he would veto the infrastructure bill if it were not passed along with a larger bill backed entirely by Democrats.

He later withdrew from that promise when it became clear that the comments had angered Republicans.

The latest Wharton study comes months after the school analyzed the Biden government’s first infrastructure proposal, called the American Jobs Plan. This original plan included spending approximately $ 2 trillion over eight years and was estimated by Wharton to reduce economic output by 0.8% in 2050.

When asked why the bipartisan plan would increase GDP over the next 29 years while the original Biden plan would not, Huntley stated that the latest legislation does not include changes to the corporate tax rate and no minimum tax on book income.

By removing corporate tax hikes in the bipartisan plan, legislators have reduced negative tax distortions that would ultimately have reduced corporate investment incentives and household savings incentives.

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Health

Mixing Pfizer, AstraZeneca Vaccines Provides Sturdy Covid Safety, Research Finds

Mixing Pfizer, AstraZeneca Vaccines Gives Strong Covid Protection, Study Finds

Initial results from a UK vaccine study suggest that mixing different brands of vaccine can produce a protective immune response against Covid-19. In the study, volunteers produced high levels of antibodies and immune cells after receiving a dose of the Pfizer BioNTech vaccine and a dose of the AstraZeneca Oxford shot.

Giving the vaccines in any order will likely provide effective protection, said Dr. Matthew Snape, a vaccines expert at Oxford University, at a news conference Monday. “Any of these schedules I think could be argued and expected to be effective,” he said.

Dr. Snape and his colleagues began the study called Com-COV in February. In the first wave of the study, they gave 830 volunteers one of four vaccine combinations. Some received two doses from Pfizer or AstraZeneca, both of which have been shown to be effective against Covid-19. Others got a dose of AstraZeneca, followed by one from Pfizer, or vice versa.

With the first wave of volunteers, the researchers waited four weeks between doses. Studies have shown that the AstraZeneca vaccine offers greater protection when the second dose is delayed for up to 12 weeks. Therefore, the researchers are also conducting a separate 12-week study that should provide results over the next month.

The researchers found that volunteers reported more chills, headaches, and muscle aches than people who received two doses of the same vaccine. But the side effects were short-lived.

Dr. Snape and his colleagues then took blood samples to measure the immune response in the volunteers. They found that those who received two doses of Pfizer-BioNTech produced antibody levels about 10 times higher than those who received two doses of AstraZeneca. Volunteers who received Pfizer followed by AstraZeneca showed antibody levels about five times higher than those who received two doses of AstraZeneca. And volunteers who received AstraZeneca followed by Pfizer achieved antibody levels about as high as those who received two doses of Pfizer.

Dr. Snape said the differences would most likely decrease in the volunteers who received a second dose after 12 weeks when the AstraZeneca vaccine had more time to intensify its effects.

The study also found that using different vaccines produced higher levels of immune cells prepared to attack the coronavirus than when giving two doses of the same vaccine. Dr. Snape said it was not yet clear why mixing had this advantage. “It’s very fascinating, let’s say so much,” he said.

Dr. Snape and colleagues have started a similar study, adding Moderna and Novavax vaccines to their list of possibilities.

For now, he said, the best course of action remains to get two doses of the same vaccine. Large clinical studies have clearly shown that this strategy reduces the likelihood of developing Covid-19. “Your default should be what has been shown to work,” said Dr. Snape.

But there are many cases where that is not possible. Vaccine deliveries are sometimes delayed due to manufacturing issues, for example. Younger people in some countries have been advised not to receive a second dose of AstraZeneca due to concerns about the low risk of blood clots. In situations like this, it’s important to know if people can switch to another vaccine.

“This provides reassuring evidence that should work,” said Dr. Snape.

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Health

Hundreds of thousands might be affected by lengthy Covid, British research suggests

Symptoms, spread and what to look out for

Healthcare workers in North Memorial’s 2019s South Six and South Seven Intensive Care Units treated patients critically ill with COVID-19 on Monday, Dec. 7, 2020 at North Memorial Health Hospital in Robbinsdale, Minn.

Aaron Lavinsky | Star Tribune via Getty Images

A study in England looking at persistent Covid-19 symptoms suggests that around 2 million people in the country may have had the condition known as “long Covid.”

The study, part of Imperial College London’s REACT research which is tracking the virus in England, saw 508,707 people across the country of roughly 56 million asked whether they’d had Covid (confirmed or suspected), and asked about the presence and duration of 29 different symptoms linked to the virus.

Among the 76,155 participants that said they had experienced a symptomatic Covid infection, 37.7% said they experienced at least one symptom lasting 12 weeks or more, while almost 15% of people said they had experienced three or more symptoms lasting 12 weeks or more.

The symptoms of long Covid can vary, with people reporting ongoing fatigue, shortness of breath, memory loss or problems with concentration (dubbed “brain fog”), insomnia, chest pain or dizziness, as well as other symptoms. But it is still poorly understood and scientists don’t yet know why some people continue to have symptoms post-Covid, and others none.

“In this large community-based study of symptoms following Covid-19 among adults aged 18 years and above in England, participants reported high prevalence of persistent symptoms lasting 12 weeks or more,” the researchers at Imperial noted of their latest study.

Extrapolating the findings in the study to the wider Covid backdrop in England, where there have been 4.07 million Covid cases confirmed to date, the study could mean that over 2 million adults who have had the virus in England may have experienced some form of long Covid.

“Estimates ranged from 5.8% of the population experiencing one or more persistent symptoms post-Covid-19 (corresponding to over 2 million adults in England), to 2.2% for three or more persistent symptoms (just under a million adults in England),” the researchers noted.

They said that their estimates of the proportion of people with persistent Covid symptoms were higher than in many other studies, although previous estimates have varied widely.

“Our comparatively high estimate, at 37.7% of people with Covid-19 experiencing one or more symptoms at 12 weeks, may partly reflect the large list of symptoms we surveyed, many of which are common and not specific to Covid-19. However, we asked participants only about symptoms that they related to a confirmed or suspected episode of Covid-19, and not to symptoms more generally.”

Scientists are still investigating long Covid, and experts have urged the British government to address its public health implications; the National Health Service has opened long Covid assessment centers, for example.

“A substantial proportion of people with symptomatic Covid-19 go on to have persistent symptoms for 12 weeks or more, which is age-dependent. Clinicians need to be aware of the differing manifestations of Long Covid which may require tailored therapeutic approaches,” researchers at Imperial said.

The survey data was collected between Sept. 15 last year and Feb. 8 and the study is a preprint, and has not yet been peer-reviewed or published in a journal. 

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A Coronavirus Epidemic Hit 20,000 Years In the past, New Research Finds

A Coronavirus Epidemic Hit 20,000 Years Ago, New Study Finds

Researchers have found evidence that a coronavirus epidemic swept East Asia about 20,000 years ago and was devastating enough to leave an evolutionary imprint on the DNA of people living today.

The new study suggests that the region was plagued by an ancient coronavirus for many years, researchers say. The finding could have devastating effects on the Covid-19 pandemic if it is not brought under control soon with vaccinations.

“It should worry us,” said David Enard, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Arizona who led the study, which was published Thursday in the journal Current Biology. “What is happening now could last for generations.”

So far, researchers have not been able to look very far back into the history of this family of pathogens. Over the past 20 years, three coronaviruses have adapted to infect people and cause serious respiratory illnesses: Covid-19, SARS, and MERS. Studies on each of these coronaviruses suggest that they jumped into our species from bats or other mammals.

Four other coronaviruses can also infect people, but usually only cause mild colds. Scientists didn’t directly observe how these coronaviruses became human pathogens, so they relied on indirect clues to gauge when the jumps happened. Coronaviruses acquire new mutations at roughly regular rates, and so by comparing their genetic variation it can be determined when they deviated from a common ancestor.

The youngest of these mild coronaviruses, called HCoV-HKU1, crossed species boundary in the 1950s. The oldest, called HCoV-NL63, can be up to 820 years old.

But before that, the coronavirus trail got cold – until Dr. Enard and his colleagues applied a new method to the search. Instead of looking at the coronavirus genes, the researchers looked at the effects on the DNA of their human hosts.

Viruses cause enormous changes in the human genome over generations. A mutation that protects against a viral infection can make the difference between life and death and is passed on to the offspring. For example, a life-saving mutation could allow humans to hack up the proteins of a virus.

But viruses can also develop. Your proteins can change shape to overcome a host’s defenses. And these changes could spur the host to develop even more counter-offensives, which leads to more mutations.

If a random new mutation creates resistance to a virus, it can quickly become more common from one generation to the next. And other versions of this gene are becoming rarer. So if, in large groups of people, one version of a gene dominates all the others, scientists know that it is most likely a sign of rapid evolution in the past.

In recent years, Dr. Enard and his colleagues searched the human genome for these genetic variation patterns to reconstruct the history of a number of viruses. When the pandemic broke out, he wondered if ancient coronaviruses had left their own mark.

He and his colleagues compared the DNA of thousands of people from 26 different populations around the world, looking at a combination of genes known to be critical for coronaviruses but not other types of pathogens. In East Asian populations, the scientists found that 42 of these genes had a dominant version. That was a strong signal that people in East Asia had adapted to an ancient coronavirus.

But whatever happened in East Asia seemed to be confined to that region. “When we compared them to populations around the world, we couldn’t find the signal,” said Yassine Souilmi, postdoctoral fellow at the University of Adelaide in Australia and co-author of the new study.

The scientists then tried to estimate how long East Asians had already adapted to a coronavirus. They took advantage of the fact that once a dominant version of a gene begins to be passed down through the generations, it can acquire harmless random mutations. The more time passes, the more of these mutations accumulate.

Dr. Enard and his colleagues found that all 42 genes had about the same number of mutations. That meant they had all evolved rapidly at about the same time. “This is a signal that we should definitely not expect by chance,” said Dr. Enard.

They estimated that all of these genes developed their antiviral mutations sometime between 20,000 and 25,000 years ago, most likely over the course of a few centuries. This is a surprising finding, since the East Asians did not live in dense communities at the time, but rather formed small groups of hunters and gatherers.

Aida Andres, an evolutionary geneticist at University College London who was not involved in the new study, said she found the work compelling. “I’m pretty sure there is something,” she said.

Still, she didn’t think it was possible to give an accurate estimate of how long ago the ancient epidemic was. “Timing is a complicated thing,” she said. “Whether that happened a few thousand years before or after – I personally think that we can’t be so sure about it.”

Scientists looking for drugs to fight the new coronavirus may want to study the 42 genes that evolved in response to the old epidemic, said Dr. Souilmi. “It actually points us out to molecular buttons to adjust the immune response to the virus,” he said.

Dr. Anders agreed, saying that the genes identified in the new study should receive special attention as drug targets. “You know they are important,” she said. “That’s the beauty of evolution.”

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Health

New Covid research hints at long-term lack of mind tissue, Dr. Scott Gottlieb warns

U.S. potentially facing ‘perpetual infection’ of Covid, says Gottlieb

Dr. Scott Gottlieb warned on Thursday of the potential for long-term brain loss related to Covid, citing a new study from the UK.

“In short, the study suggests that there could be long-term loss of brain tissue from Covid, and that would have some long-term consequences,” said the former FDA chief and CNBC employee.

“You could compensate for that over time, so the symptoms of it may go away, but you will never get the tissue back if the virus actually destroys it,” said Gottlieb, serving on the board of Covid vaccine maker Pfizer.

The UK study looked at brain imaging before and after coronavirus infection, specifically looking at the potential effects on the nervous system.

Gottlieb told CNBC’s “The News with Shepard Smith” that the destruction of brain tissue could explain why Covid patients have lost their sense of smell.

“The decrease in the amount of cortical tissue happened by chance in regions of the brain that are near the places responsible for the odor,” he said. “What it suggests is that the odor, the loss of smell, is just an effect of a more primary process that is going on, and that process is actually the shrinking of the cortical tissue.”

Disclosure: Scott Gottlieb is a CNBC employee and a member of the board of directors of Pfizer, genetic testing startup Tempus, health technology company Aetion Inc., and biotechnology company Illumina.

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Health

Mother and father and caregivers reported psychological well being points extra usually than others through the pandemic, a C.D.C. examine says.

Parents and caregivers reported mental health issues more often than others during the pandemic, a C.D.C. study says.

Parents and unpaid caregivers of adults in the United States reported far higher rates of mental health issues during the coronavirus pandemic than people who held neither of those roles, federal researchers reported on Thursday.

About 70 percent of parents and adult caregivers — such as those tending to older people, for example — and about 85 percent of people who were both reported adverse mental health symptoms during the pandemic, versus about a third of people who did not hold those responsibilities, according to new research by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The study also found that people who were both parent and caregivers were eight times more likely to have seriously considered suicide than people who held neither role.

“These findings highlight that parents and caregivers, especially those balancing roles both as parents and caregivers, experienced higher levels of adverse mental health symptoms during the Covid-19 pandemic than adults without these responsibilities,” the authors said.

“Caregivers who had someone to rely on for support had lower odds of experiencing any adverse mental health symptoms,” they said.

The report follows innumerable anecdotes and several studies suggesting spikes in mental health problems among parents and caregivers during the pandemic. But the new C.D.C. report noted that “without prepandemic mental health data in this sample, whether adverse mental health symptoms were caused by or worsened by the pandemic is unknown.”

The study is based on data from online English-language surveys administered to panels of U.S. residents run by Qualtrics, a company that conducts commercial surveys, for the Covid-19 Outbreak Public Evaluation Initiative, an effort to track American attitudes and behaviors during the pandemic. The data was gathered from Dec. 6 to 27 last year, and from Feb. 16 to March 8 of this year, and relied on 10,444 respondents, weighted to match U.S. demographic data, 42 percent of whom identified as parents or adult caregivers.

The study noted that the results might not fully represent the U.S. population, because of factors like the surveys only being presented online and in English.

The surveys included screening items for depression, anxiety, Covid-19 trauma and stress-related disorders, and asked respondents whether they had experienced suicidal thinking in the past month. About half of the parent-caregivers who responded said that they had recently had suicidal thoughts.

Elizabeth A. Rohan, a health scientist at the C.D.C. and one of the study’s authors, said in an interview that what set this research apart was a large sample size and a broad definition of caregiver, which allowed for a more inclusive picture of people in that role.

“Our net captured more people than other surveys,” Dr. Rohan said.

Dr. Rohan said that the study reinforced the need to destigmatize mental health issues among caregivers and for better support systems. Communication is key, she said, and “it doesn’t have to be professional help.”

She added, “We cannot underestimate the importance of staying connected to one another,” which is helpful whether the person is “a trusted friend, a family member or a professional.”

If you are having thoughts of suicide, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 (TALK). You can find a list of additional resources at SpeakingOfSuicide.com/resources.

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Health

Research Finds Many Submit-Covid Sufferers Are Experiencing New Medical Issues

Study Finds Many Post-Covid Patients Are Experiencing New Medical Problems

The report “shows the point that Covid can affect almost any organ system for a long time,” said Dr. Ziyad Al-Aly, director of research and development for the VA St. Louis Health Care System, who was not involved in the new study.

“Some of these manifestations are chronic diseases that last a lifetime and will scar some individuals and families forever,” added Dr. Al-Aly, the author of a major study of persistent symptoms in Covid patients published in April in the Veterans Affairs Department, added.

In the new study, the most common problem for which patients sought medical help was pain – including inflammation of the nerves and pain related to nerves and muscles – which was reported by more than 5 percent of patients, or nearly 100,000 people, more than a fifth of those who have reported post-Covid issues. Difficulty breathing, including shortness of breath, suffered in 3.5 percent of post-Covid patients.

Nearly 3 percent of patients sought treatment for symptoms marked with diagnostic codes of malaise and fatigue, a broad category that could include problems like brain fog and fatigue that worsen after physical or mental activity – effects beyond that of many people with long Covid were reported.

Other new problems for patients, especially adults in their 40s and 50s, included high cholesterol, which was diagnosed in 3 percent of all post-Covid patients, and high blood pressure, which was diagnosed in 2.4 percent, the report said . Dr. Al-Aly said that such health conditions, which are generally not viewed as an aftereffect of the virus, “make it increasingly clear that post-Covid or long-term Covid have a metabolic signature characterized by disorders in the metabolic machinery”.

Relatively few deaths – 594 – occurred 30 days or more after Covid, and most were among people hospitalized for their coronavirus infection, the report said.

The study, like many with electronic records, only looked at some aspects of the post-Covid landscape. It didn’t say when the patients’ symptoms appeared or how long the problems lasted, and it didn’t accurately assess when patients sought help from doctors after an infection, only that it lasted 30 days or more.

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Health

Vaccinated Adults Helps Defend Unvaccinated Kids, Research Finds

Vaccinated Adults Helps Protect Unvaccinated Children, Study Finds

New data from Israel, which had the fastest Covid-19 vaccine rollout in the world, provides real evidence that widespread vaccination against the coronavirus can protect unvaccinated people as well.

The Israeli study, published Thursday in the journal Nature Medicine, capitalized on the fact that until recently Israel only vaccinated people 16 and older. For every 20 percentage points increase in the proportion of 16 to 50 year olds vaccinated in a community, the proportion of unvaccinated under 16 year olds who tested positive for the virus fell by half.

“Vaccination not only offers benefits to the individual vaccine, but also to the people around them,” said Roy Kishony, a biologist, physicist and data scientist who studies microbial evolution and disease at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology. Dr. Kishony led the research with Dr. Tal Patalon, who heads KSM, the Maccabi Research and Innovation Center, in Israel. The first authors of the paper are Oren Milman and Idan Yelin, researchers in Dr. Kishony’s laboratory.

Israel began vaccinating adults in December last year. Within nine weeks, it had vaccinated nearly half of its population.

The researchers examined the anonymized electronic health records of members of Maccabi Healthcare Services, an Israeli HMO. They analyzed vaccination reports and virus test results between December 6, 2020 and March 9, 2021. The records were from 177 different geographic areas with different vaccination rates and vaccination rates.

For each community, they calculated the proportion of adults between the ages of 16 and 50 who were vaccinated at different times. They also calculated the percentage of children under the age of 16 who tested positive for PCR.

They found a clear connection: As more and more adults were vaccinated in a community, the proportion of children who tested positive for the virus fell as a result.

People who are vaccinated are significantly less likely to contract the virus. Research also suggests that even if people who have been vaccinated become infected with the virus, they may have lower viral loads, which reduces their ability to be contagious. As more and more people are vaccinated, the likelihood that unvaccinated people will encounter infected, contagious people is decreasing.

“The results are consistent with the fact that vaccinated people not only do not get sick themselves, but also do not transmit the virus to others,” said Dr. Kishony. “Such effects can be intensified over several infection cycles.”

In another recent article that has not yet been published in a scientific journal, Finnish researchers reported that after vaccinating health workers, even unvaccinated family members were less likely to be infected with the virus.