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First COVAX vaccine cargo arrives in Ghana, hope for creating world

First COVAX vaccine shipment arrives in Ghana, hope for developing world

A shipment of Covid-19 vaccines from the global COVAX vaccination program will arrive at Kotoka International Airport in Accra, Ghana on February 24, 2021.

Nipah Dennis | AFP | Getty Images

The first shipment of Covid-19 vaccines, delivered under the World Health Organization’s COVAX program, arrived in Ghana on Wednesday. This is a hopeful turning point for developing countries, who may be lagging behind in the global race to vaccinate a virus that has killed nearly 2.5 million people worldwide.

The flight brought 600,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine, which is believed to be far easier to distribute in developing countries because it does not require extremely cold storage temperatures like the Pfizer-GenTech and Moderna vaccines.

The vaccines delivered on Wednesday will be prioritized for frontline medical professionals, those over 60 and those with pre-existing health conditions, according to the Ghanaian Ministry of Information.

“Today is the historic moment for which we have planned and worked so hard,” said UNICEF Executive Director Henrietta Fore in a joint statement from her agency and WHO Ghana.

“With the first shipment of cans, we can deliver on the promise of the COVAX Facility to ensure that people from less affluent countries are not left behind in the race for life-saving vaccines.”

Airport workers transport a shipment of Covid-19 vaccines from Covax’s global Covid-19 vaccination program onto dolls at Kotoka International Airport in Accra on February 24, 2021.

Nipah Dennis | AFP | Getty Images

COVAX is a global plan jointly led by WHO, an international vaccine alliance called Gavi, and the Coalition for Innovation in Epidemic Preparation.

While wealthier nations drive costly vaccine development and procurement, poorer countries suffer the consequences of inequality. Mark Suzman, executive director of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, said in December that it may be too late for the vaccines to be distributed fairly as rich countries have already closed massive deals.

Wealthy nations, making up just 14% of the world’s population, had secured 53% of the world’s top performing coronavirus vaccines by December, according to a group of human rights activists called the People’s Vaccine Alliance.

COVAX was founded to ensure fair access to vaccines worldwide. By the end of 2021, 20% of people in the 92 poorest countries in the world are to be vaccinated through donations. Several other middle-income countries will purchase vaccines through COVAX on a self-funded basis. The plan this year is to deliver 2 billion doses of vaccines that have been recognized by WHO as safe and effective.

The recordings shipped to Ghana were produced by the Indian Serum Institute, which has been granted access to the intellectual property that enables it to manufacture vaccines based on the Oxford-AstraZeneca formula. The African Union has secured around 670 million doses of the Serum Institute’s vaccine for its member countries. The goal is for 60% of the 1.3 billion people in Africa to be vaccinated in the next two to three years.

“By far the fastest of all time”

“This is amazingly important. We want the gap between vaccinating the rich and the poor to be narrowed to zero,” said Hassan Damluji, assistant director of global politics and advocacy at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, in an interview with Wednesday CNBC.

“We know that it usually takes decades for a vaccine to be developed and used for the first time in rich countries and then to reach the poorest people in the world. So Ghana receives its first shipment, just three months after the first vaccine rollouts World are more than extraordinary, “he said. “It is by far the fastest ever.”

A health worker applies a Sinovac CoronaVac Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) vaccine to an elderly Citzen on February 18, 2021 in Sao Goncalo, near Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Ricardo Moraes | Reuters

The Gates Foundation has spent $ 1.75 billion fighting the coronavirus and has focused on vaccine development within COVAX.

Damluji noted that the program’s vaccine sourcing for poor countries was funded entirely by donors at a time when every developed world economy is in recession. “So it’s pretty remarkable,” he said.

Vaccine inequality will plunge countries into deeper poverty

The exclusion of poor countries from vaccination programs launched in wealthier countries will have devastating and lasting consequences, warn economists and public health experts that dramatically increase inequalities, hinder social and economic development and leave dozens of countries in significantly higher debt.

These inequalities, according to Oxford Economics, mean that the long-term economic damage of the pandemic will be twice as severe in emerging markets as it is in developed countries. A study by the RAND Corporation predicts the global economy will lose $ 153 billion in production annually if emerging economies do not get access to vaccines.

The countries of the COVAX donation plan are to receive doses that are appropriate for their populations: Afghanistan, for example, will receive 3 million doses, while Namibia will receive almost 130,000.

The Palestinian Territories expect to receive vaccines through COVAX in March. Iran and Iraq are part of COVAX, as are many lower-income countries in the Middle East. The wealthier Gulf States have sourced their own vaccine supplies directly from the manufacturers, while some, despite their own recessions, also contribute to the COVAX fundraising pool: Saudi Arabia donated $ 300 million and Qatar donated $ 10 million.

The U.S. hadn’t made a contribution to the COVAX facility under the Trump administration, but the Biden administration has pledged the largest donation to date – $ 4 billion.

Damluji pointed out the challenges of COVAX’s goals by running extensive vaccination campaigns in countries with faulty infrastructure, limited logistics and transportation, remote populations, and in some cases violence and war.

“This stuff is a moving target. Rightly the world’s attention is on it and wants to make sure it goes well,” he said. “But a few months ago we didn’t even know which vaccines would work. And now people need them on their doorstep.”

“There will be some complications as well,” he added. “It’s the biggest health procurement effort ever.”

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U.S. Covid vaccine provide to considerably improve in March, drugmakers inform Congress

U.S. Covid vaccine supply to substantially increase in March, drugmakers tell Congress

Lillie McCray (R) receives Pfizer BioNTech’s Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) vaccine from Walgreens Doctor Ghassan Ayyad (L) at the Victor Walchirk Apartments in Evanston, Illinois on February 22, 2021.

Kamil Krzaczynski | Reuters

The supply of Covid-19 vaccines in the US is expected to increase significantly next month as manufacturers double the production pace, company executives said in prepared remarks to be delivered to Congress on Tuesday.

Pfizer expects to ship more than 13 million doses of its two-shot vaccine per week to the US by mid-March, more than double the weekly number of doses the company shipped earlier this month, said John Young, chief Pfizer business officer, writing testimonial. The testimony was released prior to a hearing before the House Committee on Energy and Trade.

Young also said Pfizer is on track to dispense 120 million doses by the end of March, and another 80 million doses are expected to expire by the end of May.

The President of Moderna, Dr. Stephen Hoge said his company is similarly working to double its shipments to the US by April, according to the testimony prepared by Hoge. Moderna hopes to ship 40 million cans a month, which is roughly double the pace, he said.

“We have doubled our monthly shipments to the US government since late 2020 and are working to double them again to more than 40 million cans per month by April,” said Hoge. “As we work to achieve these goals, we are continuously learning and working closely with our partners and the federal government to find ways to remove bottlenecks and speed up our production.”

He added in the document that if the Food and Drug Administration authorizes the company to put more vaccine doses in each vial, it would “improve performance”.

U.S. supplies are also expected to be supported by new manufacturers entering the fray. The FDA is expected to review Johnson & Johnson’s one-shot vaccine on Thursday. J&J Vice President for Medical Affairs, Dr. Richard Nettles, said in his prepared testimony that the company plans to ship more than 20 million cans in the US by the end of March.

Nettles added that the company is confident of delivering 100 million cans in the first half of the year.

Taken together, the remarks suggest the US is on track to have received 240 million doses of vaccine by the end of March, enough to vaccinate about 130 million people.

That could be a huge boon to the vaccine launch. State and local officials said the biggest restriction was the delivery of cans by the federal government. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than 75.2 million doses have been given to states, and over 64.1 million doses have been given.

The House hearing is scheduled to begin at 10:30 a.m. ET.

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Cuba’s Covid vaccine may very well be made eligible for vacationers

Cuba's Covid vaccine could be made eligible for tourists

On October 23, 2020, at the Melia Varadero International Hotel in Matanzas Province, a man is standing near a Cuban national flag. Varadero, Cuba’s main seaside resort, is reopening to international tourism amid the coronavirus pandemic.

YAMIL LOCATION | AFP | Getty Images

Cuba’s most advanced Covid-19 vaccine candidate is set to enter late-stage clinical trials next week, bringing the tiny island nation ever closer to an exceptional medical performance that analysts believe will have far-reaching ramifications across the global south.

Cuba’s most promising vaccine candidate of the four under development is Soberana 02. The vaccine name translates from Spanish to “Sovereign”, an alleged allusion to Cuba’s national pride in its world-famous healthcare system.

Soberana 02 is scheduled to enter phase 3 studies from March 1. According to official figures, up to 150,000 volunteers will take part in the tests within weeks. Phase 3 trials represent the final phase before a vaccine is generally approved by national regulatory authorities.

It comes at a time when many people in Cuba are forced to stand in line for hours to buy basic goods and the authorities continue to adhere to a decade-long US trade embargo – with sanctions that former President Donald Trump has in recent years Years.

“It’s just this incredible dichotomy,” Helen Yaffe, a Cuba expert and lecturer in economic and social history at the University of Glasgow, Scotland, told CNBC over the phone.

“On one hand, you have this high-tech biotech sector that brings a lot of hope to the global south because there is the possibility of an affordable vaccine – (and) vaccinating the global south will be the priority,” said Yaffe.

“And at the same time, Cubans get up at four or five in the morning to join the queue because there is a real shortage of really basic food and even medicine.”

What do we know about Soberana 02?

The Cuban Finlay Institute, the country’s leading biopharma institution, is overseeing the development of Soberana 02. Vicente Verez, director of the institute, has indicated that the vaccine could be available as an option to tourists later this year.

If Soberana 02 is found to be safe and effective, the development of a domestically manufactured vaccine will likely be hailed as an astounding scientific breakthrough and major political triumph. Cuba would also be the first Latin American country to immunize its population with a domestically manufactured vaccine.

Technician Mayelin Mejias will work in the vaccine aseptic and packaging processing facility at the Finlay Vaccine Institute in Havana on January 20, 2021.

YAMIL LOCATION | AFP | Getty Images

The government has not yet outlined any concrete plans for vaccinating tourists, but analysts say it is possible for foreigners traveling to Cuba to receive their first dose of vaccine on the island before subsequent doses to take away.

Although public data are limited, it is believed that up to three doses of the vaccine could be given at two-week intervals.

People are already talking about sun, sea, sand and Soberana 02. So I wouldn’t be surprised if people went to Cuba to look for the vaccine and I’m sure the Cubans will offer it.

Helen Yaffe

Lecturer in Economic and Social History at the University of Glasgow

Yaffe, who is also the author of We Are Cuba !: How a Revolutionary People Survived in a Post-Soviet World, said Cuba’s sophisticated health system would help the country introduce the vaccine “extremely” quickly.

“I can guarantee that. And if they have a vaccine every two weeks, people could be vaccinated within a month of starting,” Yaffe said.

“By the summer, people will be pretty desperate to go on vacation, and I think Cuba, which is nominating itself as the ideal travel destination. People are already talking about sun, sea, sand and Soberana 02. So I wouldn’t be surprised if Die People go to Cuba to find the vaccine and I’m sure the Cubans will offer it. “

How does it work?

The Soberana 02 vaccine is a conjugated vaccine. This is a type of vaccine that contains a portion of the spike protein that binds or conjugates to human cells to increase its stability and effectiveness.

Unlike other coronavirus vaccine candidates like Pfizer-BioNTech, Soberana 02 doesn’t require any additional cooling requirements. This should ease the logistical and administrative challenges associated with vaccination programs in low-income countries.

People line up in Havana to buy groceries on Feb.2, 2021 as Covid-19 cases emerge in the island nation.

YAMIL LOCATION | AFP | Getty Images

At a virtual session led by the Pan American Health Organization on February 5, Dr. Verez, Soberana 02 returned “encouraging results” in the early test phases. He added that the vaccination has not yet produced any significant side effects.

The Cuban government has announced that it will produce 100 million cans of Soberana 02 this year to meet the needs of its own citizens as well as those in other countries. It is said to be one of the first countries in the world to vaccinate its entire population in 2021, though many advanced nations started administering bumps almost two months ago.

Several countries have expressed an interest in purchasing the vaccine, including Vietnam, Iran, Venezuela and the African Union, which represents all 55 countries in Africa.

Cuba, which has seen relatively few Covid cases compared to other countries in the region, has seen a sharp rise in infections and deaths in recent weeks. To date, Cuba has recorded 45,361 cases of the coronavirus and 300 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University.

“One of the world’s best kept secrets”

Cuba has long been known for its medical diplomacy. Thousands of professionals have been sent abroad to help countries cope with short-term crises, natural disasters and medical emergencies.

Human rights groups have raised concerns that the Cuban government is imposing repressive rules on doctors working abroad and invoking the right to privacy, freedom, expression and association.

At the start of the Covid-19 outbreak, Cuba had an estimated 24,500 medical workers in 58 countries. Another 4,000 members of the Cuban Henry Reeve Brigade, a group of highly respected health professionals, have worked in countries from Kuwait to Mexico, Italy to South Africa.

Cuban doctors during a welcoming ceremony for Cuban health workers deployed in Cape Town, South Africa, in the Western Cape on May 24, 2020 to support efforts in the fight against COVID-19.

Mischa Jordaan | Gallo Images via Getty Images

It’s a deeply rooted tradition that the country, with just over 11 million, has more medical staff working overseas than all of the G7 countries combined.

“This is an extraordinary recording, largely unknown to the mainstream media – one of the best-kept secrets in the world,” said John Kirk, a professor in the Latin America program at Dalhousie University in Nova Scotia, Canada, via email to CNBC.

“Medical internationalism is in Cuban DNA, and the preamble to the Cuban Constitution mentions the obligation that Cuba must share its medical talent with developing countries,” he added.

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‘Model would not matter. Get the primary vaccine out there,’ Dr. Vin Gupta says

‘Brand doesn't matter. Get the first vaccine available,' Dr. Vin Gupta says

The intensive care unit and the pulmonologist Dr. Vin Gupta told CNBC’s “The News with Shepard Smith” that patients should stop weighing the pros and cons of the Covid vaccine and still get the first shot in the arms as soon as possible, a new Israeli study that shows that the Pfizer vaccine will actually stop the spread of Covid.

“People say maybe I want the Pfizer vaccine instead of Johnson & Johnson or another,” said Gupta, a professor at the Department of Health Metrics and Assessment at the University of Washington, during an interview Monday evening. “That’s the wrong way to think about it. The brand here doesn’t matter. Get the first vaccine available.”

Gupta tweeted a photo of the lungs of a Covid patient who died of life support. The lungs developed holes that were once lung tissue, and Gupta said the vaccines can prevent this type of severe progression of the virus.

“This right-sided image is severe pneumonia that requires life support,” Gupta said. “All vaccines in the pipeline or approved prevent this, regardless of the variant.”

According to the Johns Hopkins University, the United States has exceeded 500,000 deaths from the coronavirus pandemic, and that’s twice as many as any other nation. In fact, the US has recorded an average of one death per minute over the past year.

President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris honored the lives lost on Monday with a moment of silence and a candle-lighting ceremony in the White House. White House press secretary Jen Psaki also ordered Biden to lower the state flags to half the staff for the next five days. The bells at Washington National Cathedral rang 500 times in memory of the Americans killed by Covid.

The grim milestone of the pandemic comes when virus numbers improve. According to Johns Hopkins, the average daily cases are 69,986, a 52% decrease in this month alone. The average daily deaths are 1,872, the lowest since December 2. Hospital admissions are down 41% this month alone, according to the Covid Tracking Project.

However, Gupta told host Shepard Smith that people shouldn’t give up their vigilance when it comes to the virus.

“I think right now we have to be very careful how we feel about this good news,” said Gupta. “We still have to be vigilant, but yeah, that’s really good news, bright at the end of the tunnel, hopefully by midsummer.”

The highly transmittable new Covid variants have surfaced in several places in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The British variant was found in 44 states, the South African variant in 10 states and the Brazilian variant in 4 states.

Gupta noted that the US doesn’t have the sequencing technology to understand the “true spread” of the variants and is another reason for Americans to remain vigilant against the virus.

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Covid vaccine shipments delayed by storm to reach by midweek: White Home advisor

Covid vaccine shipments delayed by storm to arrive by midweek: White House advisor

Boxes containing the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine are being prepared for shipment on December 13, 2020 at the Pfizer Global Supply Kalamazoo manufacturing facility in Portage, Michigan.

Morry Gash | Getty Images

All deliveries of Covid-19 vaccine doses delayed by the historic winter storm last week are expected to be delivered mid-week, Andy Slavitt, Senior White House Advisor for Covid-19 Response, said Monday.

Slavitt said Friday that shipments of about 6 million cans, equivalent to shipments worth about three days, were delayed by the storm.

“I reported on Friday that we would make up for the deliveries by the end of this week,” said Slavitt on Monday at the Covid-19 White House press conference. “We now assume that any remaining cans will be delivered by the middle of the week.”

He added that the federal government plans to ditch about 7 million vaccine doses on Monday, a combination of shots left behind from last week and some that should run out this week. He said the government’s ability to catch up quickly on the storm was thanks to members of the military and McKesson staff who the government hired to assist with distribution and logistics in getting the vaccine up and running.

“Seventy McKesson employees volunteered to work Saturday night and Sunday morning at 1am to prepare shipments for an 11am transit deadline,” he said, adding that UPS employees are also flexible on delayed deliveries could react.

Slavitt added that although the White House expected to catch up on the doses dispensed quickly, “it will take some time” for vaccination centers to catch up on vaccinations.

“We encourage vaccination centers to follow the same example of those who work longer hours to catch up on supplies by allowing more appointments to vaccinate the anxious public as soon as possible,” he said. Slavitt added that vaccination centers are still closed in some parts of the country that were particularly hard hit by the storm.

The pace of vaccination in Texas, rocked by the storm that left millions in the state without electricity, suffered badly. Slavitt said the 7-day average of daily doses received fell 31% over the past week.

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Biden Covid group briefs press as winter storm delays vaccine deliveries

I took 'no pleasure' in contradicting Trump on Covid

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President Joe Biden’s Covid-19 Response Team plans to hold a press conference on Friday while a massive winter storm has closed vaccine dispensaries and delayed shipments to the United States

The Chief Medical Officer of the White House, Dr. Anthony Fauci, warned Thursday that the power outages and winter storm in Texas are a “significant” problem for Covid-19 vaccine distribution this week. The Biden government has announced a number of moves in recent weeks to increase vaccine intake, such as shipping cans directly to retail pharmacies and community health centers.

“We just have to make up for it as soon as the weather subsides a bit, the ice melts and we can get the trucks and the people out,” said Fauci during an interview with MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell.

FedEx and UPS package centers in the Midwest were also hit by the storm, delaying vaccine shipments across the country.

The delay comes because the country’s leading health authorities, including Fauci and the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Dr. Rochelle Walensky, calling on Americans to contain the spread of the virus so that the US can give vaccines before highly contagious variants make the pandemic worse.

Read CNBC’s live updates for the latest news on the Covid-19 outbreak.

– CNBC’s Berkeley Lovelace Jr. contributed to this report.

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Historic winter storm delays Covid vaccine shipments throughout the U.S.

Historic winter storm delays Covid vaccine shipments across the U.S.

Snow plow carts clear a street in New York, United States on Thursday, December 17, 2020.

Angus Mordant | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Deliveries of Covid-19 vaccine doses were delayed in several states this week due to historic winter storms across the country, state and federal officials said.

Almost all of the cans that were supposed to arrive in New York state this past weekend have been delayed, Governor Andrew Cuomo said late Thursday.

“Any dose that should have been shipped on Monday was withheld and limited numbers of Pfizer vaccines left shipping facilities on Tuesday and Wednesday,” Cuomo said, adding that the state is working with vendors to “increase the number reduce the deadlines that are required. ” be moved. “

It’s not just New York. Samantha Bequer, a spokeswoman for the Florida Division of Emergency Management, said more than 200,000 cans expected this week had not arrived.

“The state is still expecting full vaccine allocation by week 10,” Bequer said in a statement. “Yesterday, the state was notified that federal deliveries of Moderna vaccines are still being delayed due to severe weather. At this point in time, the state has not been given a new timetable for when expected delayed deliveries will occur.”

Bequer said the state is working with vendors advising them to postpone, but not cancel, vaccine appointments hit by the setbacks.

In Colorado, state officials said earlier this week that a shipment of more than 130,000 cans was delayed due to the storm. They said the storm hit a vaccine distribution center in Tennessee, which has pushed back shipments to several states.

The North Carolina Department of Health said Thursday it had been informed by the federal government of ongoing delays in some deliveries and deliveries this week due to severe weather.

The Virginia Department of Health said Thursday that the expected delivery of more than 106,000 shots will likely be delayed “due to distribution channels in the Midwest and elsewhere that are currently closed”.

Andy Slavitt, the White House’s senior advisor on Covid Response, confirmed Friday that there is now about 6 million doses backlog affecting all 50 states. “Many states” were able to make up for the missed deliveries with existing inventory, he said at a Covid-19 briefing in the White House.

Health officials in California, Louisiana, and Georgia have also confirmed delays in their shipments.

The Georgian Ministry of Health announced earlier this week that Pfizer and Moderna were holding shipments due to the weather, which “severely affected shipments of COVID-19 vaccines to Georgia”.

White House officials have recognized the setbacks. The chief physician Dr. Anthony Fauci warned Thursday that the storm is creating a significant problem for vaccine distribution.

“Well, obviously it’s a problem. It slowed down and stalled in some places,” Fauci told MSNBC. “We just have to make up for it as soon as the weather subsides a bit, the ice melts and we can get the trucks and the people out.”

Slavitt told CNN Thursday evening that officials “will have to work double next week, provided the weather improves”. However, he added that “there has not been a single vaccine that is spoiled”.

“We will keep these vaccines safe and sound, then give them to people and catch up as soon as the weather allows,” he said.

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Biden speaks at Pfizer vaccine manufacturing website as storm delays shipments

Biden speaks at Pfizer vaccine manufacturing site as storm delays shipments

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President Joe Biden speaks at Pfizer’s Covid-19 vaccine factory in Kalamazoo, Michigan on Friday as his government works to increase the supply of doses in the U.S.

Earlier in the day, government officials said the massive winter storms in the Midwest and Texas had delayed delivery of 6 million Covid-19 vaccine doses this week, affecting every state in the US. The backlog equates to three days of late deliveries, Andy Slavitt, Senior White House Advisor on Covid Response, said during a news conference.

Slavitt also announced that the government is working with Florida and Pennsylvania to open five more vaccination centers.

Four of the five vaccination centers will be located in the cities of Jacksonville, Miami, Orlando and Tampa, Florida. The four sites could vaccinate up to 12,000 people a day. A fifth center in Philadelphia will be able to vaccinate 6,000 people a day, he said.

Read CNBC’s live updates for the latest news on the Covid-19 outbreak.

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Research Counsel Folks Who Had Covid-19 Ought to Get Single Vaccine Dose

People Who Have Had Covid Should Get Single Vaccine Dose, Studies Suggest

Almost 30 million people in the United States – and likely many others whose diseases have never been diagnosed – have been infected with the coronavirus to date. Should these people still be vaccinated?

Two new studies answer this question with an emphatic yes.

In fact, research suggests that for these people, just one dose of the vaccine is enough to charge their antibodies and destroy the coronavirus – and even some other infectious variants.

The results of these new studies are consistent with the results of two others published in the past few weeks. Taken together, the research suggests that people who have had Covid-19 should be immunized – but a single dose of the vaccine may be enough.

“I think it’s a really strong rationale for why people who were previously infected with Covid should get the vaccine,” said Jennifer Gommerman, an immunologist at the University of Toronto who was not involved in the new research.

A person’s immune response to a natural infection varies widely. Most people make plenty of antibodies that last for many months. However, some people who have had mild or no symptoms of Covid-19 produce few antibodies that quickly drop to undetectable levels.

The vaccines “even hit the pitch,” said Dr. Gommerman, so that anyone who has recovered from Covid-19 will make enough antibodies to protect against the virus.

The latest study, which has not yet been published in a scientific journal, analyzed blood samples from people with Covid-19. The results suggest that her immune system would have problems fighting off B.1.351, the coronavirus variant first identified in South Africa.

But a shot of the Pfizer BioNTech or Moderna vaccine changed the picture dramatically: It increased the amount of antibodies in her blood by a thousand times – “a massive, massive surge,” said Andrew T. McGuire, immunologist at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, who led the study.

Rinsed with antibodies, samples from all participants were able to neutralize not only B.1.351, but also the coronavirus that caused the SARS epidemic in 2003.

In fact, the antibodies appeared to work better than those in people who did not have Covid and had received two doses of a vaccine. Several studies have shown that the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines are about five times less effective against the variant.

The researchers received blood samples from 10 volunteers in the Seattle Covid Cohort Study who were vaccinated months after contracting the coronavirus. Seven of the participants received the Pfizer BioNTech vaccine and three received the Moderna vaccine.

Blood taken about two to three weeks after vaccination showed a significant increase in antibody levels compared to the samples taken before vaccination. The researchers don’t yet know how long the increased levels of antibodies will last, but “hopefully they will last,” said Dr. McGuire.

The researchers also saw a surge in immune cells remembering and fighting the virus, said Dr. McGuire. “It looks pretty clear that we are boosting their pre-existing immunity,” he said.

In another new study, New York University researchers found that a second dose of the vaccine was of no great benefit at all for people with Covid-19 – a phenomenon that has also been seen with vaccines against other viruses.

In this study, most people had been infected with the coronavirus eight or nine months previously, but their antibodies increased hundreds to a thousand times with the first dose of a vaccine. However, after the second dose, the antibody levels did not rise any further.

“It is real evidence of the strength of immunological memory that they are given a single dose and have a huge increase,” said Dr. Mark J. Mulligan, director of the NYU Langone Vaccine Center and lead author of the study.

In some parts of the world, including the United States, a significant minority of the population is already infected, noted Dr. Mulligan firmly. “You should definitely be vaccinated,” he said.

It is unclear whether the thousand-fold increase in antibody levels recorded in the laboratory will occur in real-world environments. However, research shows that a single shot is enough to significantly raise antibody levels, said Florian Krammer, an immunologist at the Icahn School of Medicine on Mount Sinai in New York.

Dr. Krammer led another of the new studies that showed that people who had Covid-19 and received a dose of vaccine had more serious side effects from the vaccination and had more antibodies than those who had not been infected before.

“When you put all four papers together, you get pretty good information about people who have had an infection and only need one vaccination,” said Dr. Krammer.

He and other researchers are trying to convince scientists from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to recommend only one dose for those who have recovered from Covid-19.

Ideally, these people should be monitored after the first shot in case their antibody levels drop after a few weeks or months, said Dennis R. Burton, an immunologist at the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California.

The fact that the charged antibodies seen in the new study can fight the 2003 SARS virus suggests that a single dose of the vaccine may have induced the volunteer’s bodies to produce “largely neutralizing antibodies” – immune molecules that are able to target a wide range of related antibodies to viruses, said Dr. Burton.

He and other scientists have spent decades investigating whether largely neutralizing antibodies can fight multiple versions of HIV at the same time. HIV mutates faster than any other virus and evades most antibodies quickly.

The new coronavirus is mutating much more slowly, but there are now several variants of the virus that appear to have become more contagious or which are thwarting the immune system. The new study could provide clues on how to make a single vaccine that stimulates the production of largely neutralizing antibodies that can destroy all variants of the coronavirus, said Dr. Burton.

Without such a vaccine, scientists would have to adjust the vaccines every time the virus changes significantly. “You’re kind of a whac-a-mole approach,” he said. It will likely take many months, if not more, to develop and test this type of vaccine against the coronavirus, but “this is the longer term way to approach this virus.”

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We want extra Covid vaccine doses and it must be simpler to get them, state and native well being officers say

We need more Covid vaccine doses and it needs to be easier to get them, state and local health officials say

People wearing protective masks wait in line to receive a dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine at a major vaccination site in Sacramento, California on Thursday, February 4, 2021.

David Paul Morris | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Scientists and health officials told Congress on Friday that the federal government must increase its supply of Covid-19 vaccine doses to streamline the process for ingestion.

These two changes are crucial if federal officials want to increase the number of people who receive the shots, scientists and public health officials who have testified before the Science, Space and Technology House Committee.

“Even people who are motivated and excited about the vaccine can be put off by the slightest friction in the system, whether it is complex logistics, inconvenience or confusing instructions,” said Dr. Alison Buttenheim, Scientific Director of the Center for Health Incentives and Behavioral Economics.

The hearing will take place when elected officials and health professionals address hesitation and disinformation related to the Covid-19 vaccine.

“Fix the simple stuff,” said Buttenheim. “In all honesty, it’s often easier to fix these problems than to change someone’s mind.”

Dr. Philip Huang, director and health department for the Dallas County Department of Health, said the county is trying to address “logistical and problematic factors” by providing online registration and phone banking for vaccine appointments, and by working with community leaders to register people for vaccinations of drive-through vaccination stations.

Keith Reed, assistant commissioner for the Oklahoma State Department of Health, said the state opened an extended timeframe to give residents more time to sign up for vaccine appointments.

“In order to vaccinate as many Oklahomans as possible, we opened the authorization to new priority groups before we fully vaccinated previous groups,” Reed said. “With this tactic we hope to extend the window of opportunity.”

Initiatives to reduce logistical barriers to those who wish to get vaccinations are particularly effective as vaccine supply in the US remains below community demand, according to panellists.

“Supply is the problem at this point,” said Huang. “We have over 650,000 people signed up on our waiting list to be vaccinated and the health department is receiving 9,000 doses a week.”

Health officials stressed that all Covid vaccines available in the US are effective at protecting people from serious illness, hospitalization and death. They urged people not to wait for the vaccination to get a particular brand of vaccine based on perceived effectiveness.

“The best vaccine is the one you can get tomorrow,” said Buttenheim.