Tag: Variant

Health

In Oregon, Scientists Discover a Virus Variant With a Worrying Mutation

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Post date March 6, 2021

In Oregon, Scientists Find a Virus Variant With a Worrying Mutation

Scientists in Oregon have discovered a native version of a fast-spreading variant of the coronavirus that first appeared in the UK – but now combined with a mutation that may make the variant less susceptible to vaccines.

The researchers have only found a single case of this formidable combination to date, but genetic analysis revealed that the variant was community-acquired and did not occur in the patient.

“We didn’t import this from anywhere else in the world – it happened spontaneously,” said Brian O’Roak, a geneticist at Oregon Health and Science University who led the work. He and his colleagues participate in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention efforts to track variants and have posted their results in databases shared by scientists.

The variant originally identified in the UK, named B.1.1.7, has quickly spread throughout the United States, accounting for at least 2,500 cases in 46 states. This form of the virus is both more contagious and deadly than the original version and is expected to be responsible for most infections in America in a few weeks.

The new version, which surfaced in Oregon, shares the same backbone, but also has a mutation – E484K or “Eek” – seen in variants of the virus circulating in South Africa, Brazil and New York City.

Laboratory studies and clinical studies in South Africa show that the Eek mutation makes current vaccines less effective by weakening the body’s immune response. (The vaccines are still working, but the results are worrying enough that Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna have started testing new versions of their vaccines to defeat the variant found in South Africa.)

The B.1.1.7 variant with Eek has also appeared in the UK and has been described by scientists as a “worrying variant”. But the virus identified in Oregon appears to have evolved independently, said Dr. O’Roak.

Dr. O’Roak and colleagues found the variant among coronavirus samples collected by the Oregon State Public Health Lab across the state, including some from a health care outbreak. Of the 13 test results they analyzed, 10 turned out to be B.1.1.7 alone and one as a combination.

Other experts said the discovery wasn’t surprising given that the Eek mutation appeared in forms of the virus around the world. However, the occurrence of the mutation in B.1.1.7 is worth seeing, they said.

In the UK, this version of the variant makes up a small number of cases. By the time the combination developed there, B.1.1.7 had already spread across the country.

Updated

March 6, 2021, 10:48 p.m. ET

“We’re at the point where B.1.1.7 is just rolling out in the US,” said Stacia Wyman, a computational genomics expert at the University of California at Berkeley. “As it evolves and slowly becomes the dominant thing, it could accumulate more mutations.”

Viral mutations can reinforce or weaken each other. For example, the variants identified in South Africa and Brazil contain many of the same mutations, including Eek. But the Brazilian version has a mutation, K417N, that is not present in the South African version.

What you need to know about the vaccine rollout

In a study published Thursday in Nature, the researchers compared antibody responses with all three affected variants – those identified in the UK, South Africa and Brazil. In line with other studies, they found that the variant that beat South Africa was the most resistant to antibodies produced by the immune system.

But the variant circulating in Brazil was not as resistant, despite carrying the Eek mutation. “If you have the second mutation, you don’t see such a bad effect,” said Michael Diamond, a viral immunologist at Washington University in St. Louis who led the study.

It is too early to say whether the Oregon variant will behave like it did in South Africa or Brazil. But the idea that other mutations might weaken Eek’s effects is “excellent news,” said Dr. Wyman.

Overall, she said, the finding in Oregon reinforces the need for people to continue taking precautions, such as wearing a mask, until a significant portion of the population is vaccinated.

“People don’t have to freak out, they just have to be vigilant,” she said. “We cannot give up our vigilance as long as these more transferrable variants are still in circulation.”

Tags Find, Mutation, Oregon, Scientists, Variant, Virus, Worrying

World News

Covid-19: Reside Updates on Brazil Variant, Instances and Vaccine

Post author By
Post date March 2, 2021

A funeral on Monday in Manaus, Brazil, for a person who died of Covid-19. A variant from Brazil, P.1, is a new worry for scientists.

Here’s what you need to know:

Credit…Raphael Alves/EPA, via Shutterstock

In just a matter of weeks, two variants of the coronavirus have become so familiar that you can hear their inscrutable alphanumeric names regularly uttered on television news.

B.1.1.7, first identified in Britain, has demonstrated the power to spread far and fast. In South Africa, a mutant called B.1.351 can dodge antibodies, blunting the effectiveness of some vaccines.

Scientists have also had their eye on a third concerning variant, which arose in Brazil, called P.1. Research has been slower on P.1 since its discovery in late December, leaving scientists unsure how much to worry.

“I’ve been holding my breath,” said Bronwyn MacInnis, an epidemiologist at the Broad Institute.

Now, three studies offer a sobering history of P.1’s meteoric rise in the Amazonian city of Manaus. It most likely arose there in November and then fueled a surge in coronavirus cases. It came to dominate the city partly because of an increased contagiousness, the research found.

But it also gained the ability to infect some people who had immunity from previous bouts of Covid-19. And laboratory experiments suggest that P.1 could weaken the protective effect of a Chinese vaccine now in use in Brazil.

The studies have yet to be published in scientific journals. Their authors caution that findings on cells in laboratories do not always translate to the real world and that they’ve only begun to understand P.1’s behavior.

“The findings apply to Manaus, but I don’t know if they apply to other places,” said Nuno Faria, a virologist at Imperial College London who helped lead much of the new research.

But even with the mysteries that remain around P.1, experts say that it is a variant to take seriously. “It’s right to be worried about P.1, and this data gives us the reason why,” said William Hanage, an epidemiologist at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

P.1 is now spreading across the rest of Brazil and has been found in 24 other countries. In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has recorded six cases in five states: Alaska, Florida, Maryland, Minnesota and Oklahoma.

To reduce the risks of P.1 outbreaks and reinfections, Dr. Faria said it was important to double down on every measure we have to slow the spread of the coronavirus. Masks and social distancing can work against P.1. And vaccination can help drive down its transmission and protect those who do get infected from severe disease.

“The ultimate message is that you need to step up all the vaccination efforts as soon as possible,” he said. “You need to be one step ahead of the virus.”

United States ›	United StatesOn March 1	14-day change
New cases	56,672	–21%
New deaths	1,425	–17%

World ›	WorldOn March 1	14-day change
New cases	293,587	+2%
New deaths	6,610	–21%

U.S. vaccinations ›

Credit…Juan Arredondo for The New York Times

In most parts of the United States, getting a coronavirus vaccine can feel like trying to win the lottery. People scour the internet for appointments under complex eligibility standards that vary from state to state, and even county to county.

In Indiana and Kentucky, anyone over 60 can get vaccinated, but you have to be 65 or 70 almost everywhere else. About 18 states are offering shots to grocery workers, and 32 are vaccinating teachers.

Then there is Gila County, Ariz., where any resident over 18 can walk into a clinic without an appointment and get a vaccine.

“The whole process is incredibly easy,” said Frank Struck, 24, an electrician and maintenance worker who got inoculated at a hospital in Globe, a town in the county, about 90 miles east of Phoenix. “No bureaucracy, no crazy lines — you just go in, get the shot and come out with peace of mind.”

Gila County started off with a set of qualifying standards as well. But it has been so successful at vaccinating its residents that it is now one of the first places in the United States to open eligibility to the general population.

During a pandemic that has claimed the lives of at least 209 county residents, many people in the county of 54,000 people have welcomed the broader availability of the vaccines, a boon that follows a harrowing surge in hospitalizations around the start of the year. The expanded vaccination campaign has coincided over the past two weeks with a 52 percent plunge in new cases.

Health officials and elected leaders warn that big challenges persist in Gila County, in part because, in a county where anybody can get the vaccine, not everybody wants it.

About 28 percent of county residents have received at least one dose so far, compared with the nationwide level of 14 percent, according to local health officials. Rhonda Mason, the chief nursing officer at the hospital in Globe, said the challenge ahead was to overcome misinformation and skepticism.

Credit…Frederic J. Brown/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Tens of thousands of students walked into classrooms in Chicago public schools on Monday for the first time in nearly a year. Restaurants in Massachusetts were allowed to operate without capacity limits, and venues like roller skating rinks and movie theaters in most of the state opened with fewer restrictions. And South Carolina erased its limits on large gatherings.

Across the country, the first day of March brought a wave of reopenings and liftings of pandemic restrictions, signs that more Americans were tentatively emerging from months of isolation, even if not everyone agrees that the time is ripe.

There are plenty of reasons for optimism: Vaccinations have increased significantly in recent weeks, and daily reports of new coronavirus cases have fallen across the United States from their January peaks.

In Kentucky, all but a handful of school districts are now offering in-person classes, while the state races to vaccinate teachers as quickly as possible. Gov. Andy Beshear told reporters last week that the state’s falling infection statistics showed that immunizations were beginning to make an impact.

“It means vaccinations work,” he said. “We’re already seeing it. We’re seeing it in these numbers. It’s a really positive sign.”

Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, President Biden’s chief medical adviser for Covid-19, said at a news briefing on Monday that for small groups of people who have all been fully vaccinated, there was a low risk in gathering together at home. Activities beyond that, he said, would depend on data, modeling and “good clinical common sense,” adding that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention would soon have guidance for what vaccinated people could safely do.

The positive signs come with caveats. Though the national statistics have improved drastically since January, they have plateaued in the last week or so, and the United States is still reporting more than 65,000 new cases a day on average — comparable to the peak of last summer’s surge, according to a New York Times database. The country is still averaging about 2,000 deaths per day, though deaths are a lagging indicator because it can take weeks for patients to die.

More contagious variants of the virus are circulating in the country, with the potential to push case counts upward again. Testing has fallen 30 percent in recent weeks, leaving experts worried about how quickly new outbreaks will be known. And millions of Americans are still waiting to be vaccinated.

Given all that, some experts worry that the reopenings are coming a bit too soon.

“We’re, hopefully, in between what I hope will be the last big wave, and the beginning of the period where I hope Covid will become very uncommon,” said Robert Horsburgh, an epidemiologist at the Boston University School of Public Health. “But we don’t know that. I’ve been advocating for us to just hang tight for four to six more weeks.”

The director of the C.D.C., Dr. Rochelle Walensky, said at the briefing on Monday that she was “really worried” about the rollbacks of restrictions in some states. She cautioned that with the decline in cases “stalling” and with variants spreading, “we stand to completely lose the hard-earned ground we have gained.”

And the plateauing case levels “must be taken extremely seriously,” Dr. Walensky warned at a briefing last week. She added: “I know people are tired; they want to get back to life, to normal. But we’re not there yet.”

After some counties in Washington State allowed movie theaters to reopen, Nick Butcher, 36, made up for lost time by attending screenings of the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy for three straight nights. He bought some M&Ms at the concession stand, sat distanced from others in the audience, and said he felt as though things were almost back to normal.

“I’m actually getting optimistic, over all,” said Mr. Butcher, a software engineer at Microsoft who recently recovered from a case of Covid-19, as did several relatives. “This week is one of the first times I’ve gone into my office almost since the pandemic started.”

Credit…Rajah Bose for The New York Times

Before the University of Idaho welcomed students back to campus last fall, it spent $90,000 installing temperature-scanning stations, which look like airport metal detectors, in front of its dining and athletic facilities in Moscow, Idaho. When the system detects a student walking through with an unusually high temperature, the student is asked to leave and get tested for the coronavirus.

But so far, the fever scanners, which register skin temperature, have flagged fewer than 10 people out of the 9,000 students living on or near campus. Even then, university administrators could not say whether the technology had been effective because they have not tracked students detected with fevers to see if they went on to get tested.

The University of Idaho is one of hundreds of colleges and universities that adopted fever scanners, symptom checkers, wearable heart-rate monitors and other screening technologies this school year. Such tools often cost less than a more validated health intervention: frequent virus testing of all students. They also help colleges showcase their pandemic safety efforts.

But the struggle at many colleges to keep the virus at bay has raised questions about the usefulness of the technologies. According to a New York Times database, there have been more than 530,000 virus cases on campuses since the start of the pandemic.

One problem is that temperature scanners and symptom-checking apps cannot catch the estimated 40 percent of people with the coronavirus who do not have symptoms but are still infectious. Temperature scanners can also be wildly inaccurate. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has cautioned that such symptom-based screening has only “limited effectiveness.”

The schools have a hard time saying whether — or how well — the devices have worked. Many universities and colleges are not rigorously studying effectiveness.

More than 100 schools are using a free symptom-checking app, CampusClear, that can permit students to enter campus buildings. Others are asking students to wear symptom-monitoring devices that can continuously track vital signs like skin temperature.

Administrators at Idaho and other universities said their schools were using the technology, along with policies like social distancing, as part of larger campus efforts to hinder the virus. Some said it was important for their schools to deploy the screening tools even if they were only moderately useful.

At the very least, they said, using services like daily symptom-checking apps may reassure students and remind them to be vigilant about other measures, like mask wearing.

Credit…Karla Ortiz

The books that Americans cooked from during 2020 will stand as cultural artifacts of the year when a virus forced an entire nation into the kitchen.

The pandemic has been good to cookbooks. Overall sales jumped 17 percent from 2019, according to figures from NPD BookScan, which tracks about 85 percent of book sales in the United States.

Some of the smash hits were predictable. The world domination of Joanna Gaines, the queen of shiplap, continued. The second volume of her hugely popular “Magnolia Table” cookbook franchise sailed to the top of the New York Times list of the best-selling cookbooks in 2020. Ina Garten, the cooking doyenne from the Hamptons, landed the second spot with “Modern Comfort Food,” followed by “The Happy in a Hurry Cookbook,” by the “Fox & Friends” host Steve Doocy and his wife, Kathy.

But the stir-crazy year upended the way people cook and think about food in fundamental ways.

One of the year’s 10 best-selling cookbooks on a list complied by BookScan offered 600 air-fryer recipes, owing as much to the appliance’s ability to crisp up takeout French fries as it does to its popularity with the Trader Joe’s set, who made it through the year by heating up vegetarian egg rolls and mac-and-cheese bites. It sold more than 135,000 copies.

By contrast, 30,000 copies may not sound like much, but those sales figures were big for “Cool Beans” by Joe Yonan, a treatise whose own editor predicted “would never set the world on fire.”

Everyday cooks went in search of new cuisines and projects to break up the routine. Practiced cooks who might have spent a Saturday afternoon before the pandemic hand-rolling pasta sought recipes that would help keep weeknight cooking from becoming a grind.

Plenty of people simply needed help getting any meal on the table, which drove the popularity of general cookbooks. That category was the largest of cookbooks bought in 2020, according to BookScan. Sales showed a 127 percent increase over 2019.

And underscoring the great American food dichotomy, both dessert and diet books sold well.

Credit…Scott Olson/Getty Images

Scientists and doctors who study infectious disease in children largely agreed, in a recent New York Times survey about school openings, that elementary school students should be able to attend in-person school now. With safety measures like masking and opening windows, the benefits outweigh the risks, the majority of the 175 respondents said.

They gave The Times comments on key topics, including the risks to children of being out of school; the risks to teachers of being in school; whether vaccines are necessary before opening schools; how to achieve distance in crowded classrooms; what kind of ventilation is needed; and whether their own children’s school districts got it right.

In addition to their daily work on Covid-19, most of the experts had school-aged children themselves, half of whom were attending in-person school.

They also discussed whether the new variants could change even the best-laid school opening plans. “There will be a lot of unknowns with novel variants,” said Pia MacDonald, an infectious disease epidemiologist at RTI International, a research group. “We need to plan to expect them and to develop strategies to manage school with these new threats.”

Most of the respondents work in academic research, and about a quarter work as health care providers. We asked them what their expertise taught them that they felt others needed to understand.

Over all, they said that data suggests that with precautions, particularly masks, the risk of in-school transmission is low for both children and adults.

Credit…Joe Cavaretta/South Florida Sun-Sentinel, via Associated Press

New York City added workers in the food service and hotel industries to the list of people eligible for coronavirus vaccination on Monday, the same day the governors of Florida and Ohio announced expansions for eligibility in their states.

The expansions come as the supply of vaccines being distributed nationally is ramping up, and after a third vaccine, a single-shot dose from Johnson & Johnson, was authorized for emergency use by the Food and Drug Administration over the weekend. The pace of U.S. vaccinations is again accelerating, up to about 1.82 million doses per day on average, according to a New York Times database, above last month’s peak before snowstorms disrupted distribution.

In New York City, people who work in regional food banks, food pantries and “permitted home-delivered” meal programs became eligible on Monday to receive a vaccine. Hotel workers who have direct contact with guests also became eligible.

The governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, said on Monday that people 50 and older who work in K-12 schools, law enforcement or firefighting would become eligible on Wednesday. Florida was one of the first states that decided to vaccinate anyone 65 and older, even before most essential workers, which led to long lines and confusion.

Gov. Mike DeWine of Ohio said on Monday that the state would receive more than 448,000 doses this week, including more than 96,000 doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. He said that “in response to this significant increase in the amount of vaccine coming into Ohio,” a new group of people would be eligible on Thursday to get a shot.

That group includes people with Type 1 diabetes, pregnant women and certain workers in child care and funeral services, as well as law enforcement and corrections officers.

To stay ahead of more contagious and possibly more deadly virus variants, states have been racing to ramp up vaccinations and expand eligibility. But they have often done so before the supply could increase quickly enough, creating shortages and making it harder for people to get vaccination appointments.

Credit…Tony Dejak/Associated Press

A Frontier Airlines flight from Miami to La Guardia Airport in New York was canceled on Sunday night after a large group of passengers, including several adults, refused to wear masks, the airline said.

By Monday morning, the airline was facing accusations of anti-Semitism for its treatment of the passengers, who are Hasidic Jews, as well as demands for an investigation from the Anti-Defamation League of New York and other groups. Frontier steadfastly held to its position that the passengers had refused to comply with federal rules requiring them to wear masks.

Several phone videos that have surfaced do not show the confrontation that took place between the passengers and the Frontier crew members, only the aftermath. The video footage from inside the aircraft appeared to show members of the group wearing masks. Some passengers said that the episode escalated because just one member of the group, a 15-month-old child, was not wearing one.

Videos of the passengers exiting the plane amid chaos, captured by other people on the flight, were posted on Twitter by the Orthodox Jewish Public Affairs Council. In one video, a passenger says, “This is an anti-Semitic act.”

Another video showed a couple holding a maskless baby in a car seat, as children could be heard crying and a woman explained that the young children in their group, sitting in the back of the plane, had taken off their masks to eat.

A Frontier Airlines spokeswoman said in a statement that “a large group of passengers repeatedly refused to comply with the U.S. government’s federal mask mandate.”

Tags Brazil, cases, Covid19, Live, Updates, Vaccine, Variant

Health

Virus Variant in Brazil Contaminated Many Who Had Already Recovered From Covid-19

Post author By
Post date March 2, 2021

Virus Variant in Brazil Infected Many Who Had Already Recovered From Covid-19

Within a few weeks, two variants of the coronavirus have become so popular that you can regularly hear their unfathomable alphanumeric names on the television news.

B.1.1.7, first identified in the UK, has demonstrated the ability to spread widely and quickly. In South Africa, a mutant called B.1.351 can evade human antibodies and affect the effectiveness of some vaccines.

Scientists have also kept an eye on a third variant that originated in Brazil and is called P.1. Research on P.1 had been slower since its discovery in late December, so scientists weren’t sure how much to worry about it.

“I held my breath,” said Bronwyn MacInnis, an epidemiologist at the Broad Institute.

Now three studies offer a sobering story of P.1’s meteoric rise in the Amazonian city of Manaus. It most likely occurred there in November and then led to a record spike in coronavirus cases. It came to dominate the city in part because of an increased risk of contagion, research found.

However, the ability to infect some people who had immunity to previous attacks from Covid-19 was also gained. And laboratory experiments suggest that P.1 could weaken the protective effects of a Chinese vaccine currently used in Brazil.

The new studies have yet to be published in scientific journals. Their authors warn that findings from cells in laboratories do not always translate into the real world, and they have only just begun to understand how P.1 behaves.

“The results apply to Manaus, but I don’t know if they apply to other locations,” said Nuno Faria, a virologist at Imperial College London who led much of the new research.

But even with the puzzles that existed around P.1, experts said it was a variant that should be taken seriously. “It is right to be concerned about P.1, and this data gives us the reason why,” said William Hanage, epidemiologist at Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health.

P.1 is now spreading across the rest of Brazil and has been found in 24 other countries. In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has registered six cases in five states: Alaska, Florida, Maryland, Minnesota, and Oklahoma.

To reduce the risk of P.1 outbreaks and reinfections, Dr. Faria, it is important to double up on any measure to slow the spread of the coronavirus. Masks and social distancing can work against P.1. And vaccinations can help reduce transmission and protect those who become infected from serious illnesses.

“The ultimate message is that you need to step up all vaccination efforts as soon as possible,” he said. “You have to be one step ahead of the virus.”

Dr. Faria and his colleagues began tracking down the coronavirus when it exploded in Brazil last spring. Manaus, a city of two million people in the Brazilian Amazon, was particularly hard hit. At the height of spring, the Manaus cemeteries were overwhelmed by the corpses of the dead.

But after a peak in late April, Manaus appeared to have overcome the worst of the pandemic. Some scientists believed the decline meant Manaus had gained herd immunity.

Dr. Faria and his colleagues looked for coronavirus antibodies in samples from a Manaus blood bank in June and October. They found that roughly three-quarters of Manaus residents were infected.

However, towards the end of 2020, the number of new cases increased again. “There were actually far more cases than the previous peak of cases, which was in late April,” said Dr. Faria. “And that was very puzzling to us.”

To look for variants, Dr. Faria and his colleagues launched a new genome sequencing effort in town. While B.1.1.7 had arrived in other parts of Brazil, they did not find it in Manaus. Instead, they found a variant that no one had seen before.

Updated

March 1, 2021, 9:49 p.m. ET

Many variants in their samples shared a set of 21 mutations that were not seen in other viruses circulating in Brazil. Dr. Faria texted a colleague, “I think I’m seeing something really strange and I’m pretty worried about it.”

Some mutations in particular worried him, as scientists had already found them in B.1.1.7 or B.1.351. Experiments suggested that some of the mutations might make the variants better able to infect cells. Other mutations allow them to evade antibodies from previous infections or to be produced by vaccines.

While Dr. Faria and his colleagues analyzed their results, researchers in Japan made a similar discovery. Four tourists who returned home from a trip to the Amazon on Jan. 4 tested positive for the coronavirus. Genome sequencing revealed the same mutations that Dr. Faria and his colleagues in Brazil saw.

Dr. Faria and his colleagues posted a description of P.1 on an online virology forum on January 12th. Then they investigated why P.1 is so common. Its mutations could have made it more contagious, or it could have been lucky. Coincidentally, the variant might have surfaced in Manaus when the city became more relaxed about public health policies.

It was also possible that P.1 became common because it could re-infect people. Usually, coronavirus reinfections are rare as the antibodies produced by the body after infection are effective for months. However, it was possible that P.1 had mutations that made it difficult for these antibodies to attach to it, allowing them to slip into cells and cause new infections.

The researchers tested these possibilities by tracking P.1 from its earliest samples in December. At the beginning of January it was 87 percent of the samples. By February it had completely taken over.

The researchers combined the data from genomes, antibodies and medical records in Manaus and came to the conclusion that P.1 conquered the city thanks to biology rather than luck: its mutations contributed to its spread. Like B.1.1.7, it can infect more people on average than other variants. They estimate that it is between 1.4 and 2.2 times more transmissible than other coronavirus lineages.

But it also gets a benefit from mutations that allow antibodies from other coronaviruses to escape. They estimate that out of 100 people who were infected in Manaus last year, between 25 and 61 were re-infected by P.1.

The researchers found support for this conclusion in an experiment in which they mixed P.1 virus with antibodies from Brazilians who had Covid-19 last year. They found that the effectiveness of their antibodies against P.1 decreased six-fold compared to other coronaviruses. This decline could mean that at least some people are susceptible to new infections from P.1.

“There seems to be a growing body of evidence to suggest that most of the second wave-related cases are actually some kind of reinfection,” said Dr. Faria.

Dr. Faria and other researchers are now looking across Brazil to observe the spread of P.1. Dr. Ester Sabino, an infectious disease expert at the University of São Paulo Faculty of Medicine, said one of the new outbreaks has occurred in Araraquara, a Brazilian city of 223,000 that did not have high rates of Covid-19 before P.1 arrived.

If the people of Araraquara did not have high antibody levels prior to P.1’s arrival, it suggests that the variant may have spread to locations without Manaus’ extreme history. “This could happen in any other place,” she said.

Michael Worobey, a virologist at the University of Arizona who was not involved in the research, said it was time to pay attention to P.1 in the US. He expected it to become more common in the United States, although it would have to compete with B.1.1.7, which could soon become the predominant variant in much of the nation.

“At least it will be one of the competitors,” said Dr. Worobey.

In their experiments, Dr. Faria and his colleagues also received antibodies from eight people who received CoronaVac, a Brazilian-made vaccine that was used in Brazil. They found that the antibodies produced by the vaccine were less effective at stopping the P.1 variant than other types.

Dr. Faria warned that these results, taken from cells in test tubes, don’t necessarily mean vaccines are less effective at protecting real people from P.1. Vaccines can very well provide strong protection against P.1, even if the antibodies they produce are not quite as effective. And even if the variant manages to infect vaccinated people, they will most likely remain protected from a severe attack of Covid-19.

For Dr. Sabino is the ultimate meaning of P.1 the threat that variants pose if they can appear anywhere in the world.

“It’s just a matter of time and chance,” she said.

Tags Brazil, Covid19, Infected, Recovered, Variant, Virus

Business

UK search thriller particular person contaminated with Brazil Covid variant

Post author By
Post date March 1, 2021

UK search mystery person infected with Brazil Covid variant

A worker who distributes vaccination cards as members of the public will be vaccinated at a drive-through vaccine center in Hyde near Manchester, UK on Friday January 8, 2021.

Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images

UK health officials are keen to track down one in six people infected with a contagious variant of the coronavirus that was originally identified in Brazil.

Up to six cases of the new strain – named P.1 and classified as a “variant of concern” by global health experts – have been identified in the UK, three in Scotland and three in England.

What worries officials, however, is that one of the three cases found in England has not been traced. The government issued a statement on Sunday noting that two of the cases in England came from a South Gloucestershire household and had traveled to Brazil in the past.

The cases in South Gloucestershire, southeast England, were quickly followed up by a team from Public Health England and their contacts were identified and retested, the government said. All passengers on the same flight – Swiss Air flight LX318 from Sao Paulo via Zurich to London Heathrow on February 10 – were also followed by officials.

As a precautionary measure, health officials are stepping up testing of asymptomatic cases in the South Gloucestershire area and increasing sequencing of positive samples from the area.

The mysterious case

However, further research is ongoing into a separate third case of the variant identified in England. The health authorities are calling on anyone who did not receive the result of a Covid test carried out on February 12 or 13 to report.

“The person did not fill out their test registration card, so no follow-up details are available,” the government stated.

“We therefore ask anyone who took a test on February 12th or 13th and has not yet received the result or has an incomplete test registration card to call 119 in England or 0300 303 2713 in Scotland for assistance as soon as possible receive.”

UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock will hold a meeting later Monday to inform UK lawmakers of all parties of the variant, the BBC reported.

Why are officials concerned?

Health officials are concerned because the variant first identified in Brazil is believed to be a more contagious strain of the coronavirus and could cause more severe infections. There are also concerns that it could make coronavirus vaccines less effective. However, this is not confirmed and research is being carried out to see if it is.

While scientists are doing this research, vaccine manufacturers are developing booster vaccinations for target variants.

The UK is already grappling with the spread of a far more contagious variant, which was responsible for an increase in cases over the winter. The strain has since become dominant in the country and has spread worldwide.

The latest weekly report from the World Health Organization said 101 countries have now reported cases of the variant first identified in the UK.

Regarding the strain found in Brazil, it said 29 countries have reported cases so far. This P.1 variant was first identified in four travelers from Brazil to Japan in January during a routine screening at Haneda Airport outside Tokyo.

The strain has been classified as “Concerning” because it has some crucial mutations with the variant first identified in South Africa. According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the P.1 variant has a total of 17 unique mutations and was first detected in the US at the end of January.

regulate

When the first cases of this variant were discovered in the UK, people traveling from abroad had to self-isolate at home for 10 days.

However, that changed on February 15th and now travelers to the UK must be quarantined in hotels for 10 days at their own expense. In mid-January, Great Britain banned travelers from various South American countries from entering the country unless they had a right of residence.

The move was an attempt to prevent the spread of infectious variants and potentially undermine the previously successful introduction of the coronavirus vaccine in the country. The UK reached another milestone on Sunday after vaccinating 20 million people with a first dose of a Covid vaccine.

Dr. Susan Hopkins, PHE’s Strategic Response Director for Covid-19 and NHS Test and Trace Medical Advisor, said the new cases in the UK were identified thanks to the country’s advanced sequencing capabilities, “which means we are finding more variants and mutations than many other countries.” and are therefore able to act quickly. “

“The most important thing is that whatever the variant, Covid-19 spreads the same way. That means the measures taken to contain the spread won’t change,” she said, advocating good personal hygiene and leaving only the house for essential reasons.

Scotland’s Falls

The three cases identified in Scotland were found in people returning to Aberdeen from Brazil via Paris and London. These cases are not related to the three cases in England.

As required at the time, the individuals entered self-isolation upon their return to Scotland and subsequently tested positive for coronavirus. The people then self-isolate for the required 10-day period, the Scottish Government said in a statement.

Due to possible concerns about this variant, other passengers on the flight from London to Aberdeen were contacted, the Scottish government found.

Tags Brazil, Covid, Infected, mystery, person, search, Variant

Health

A New Coronavirus Variant Is Spreading in New York, Researchers Report

Post author By
Post date February 25, 2021

A new form of coronavirus is spreading rapidly in New York City and has a worrying mutation that can make vaccines less effective, two research teams have found.

The new variant, named B.1.526, first appeared in samples collected in the city in November. By the middle of this month, roughly every fourth virus sequence was in a database shared by scientists.

A study of the new variant, led by a group at Caltech, went online on Tuesday. The other was sent to a preprint server by researchers at Columbia University, but is not yet public.

The study has not been peer-reviewed or published in a scientific journal. However, the consistent results suggest the variant’s prevalence is real, experts said.

“It’s not particularly good news,” said Michel Nussenzweig, an immunologist at Rockefeller University who was not involved in the new research. “But just knowing about it is good because then maybe we can do something about it.”

Dr. Nussenzweig said he was more concerned about the New York variant than the one that was quickly spreading in California. Another contagious new variant discovered in the UK currently affects around 2,000 cases in 45 states. It is expected to be the most widespread form of the coronavirus in the United States by the end of March.

Researchers looked at the virus’s genetic material to see how it might change. They examine genetic virus sequences taken from a small fraction of the infected in order to record the emergence of new versions.

Caltech researchers discovered the rise in B.1.526 by looking for mutations in hundreds of thousands of viral genetic sequences in a database called GISAID. “There was a recurring pattern and group of isolates in the New York area that I hadn’t seen,” said Anthony West, a computational biologist at Caltech.

He and his colleagues found that two versions of the coronavirus were more common: one with the E484K mutation seen in South Africa and Brazil, which is believed to help the virus partially evade vaccines; and another with a mutation called S477N that can affect how tightly the virus binds to human cells.

By mid-February, the two together made up about 27 percent of the viral sequences stored in the database in New York City, said Dr. West. (At the moment both are summarized as B.1.526.)

Columbia University researchers took a different approach. They sequenced 1,142 samples from patients at their medical center. They found that 12 percent of people with the coronavirus were infected with the variant that contains the E484K mutation.

Updated

Apr. 24, 2021, 8:33 p.m. ET

Patients infected with the virus that carried this mutation were, on average, about six years older and more likely to be hospitalized. While the majority of patients were found near the hospital – particularly in Washington Heights and Inwood – there were several other cases scattered across the metropolitan area, said Dr. David Ho, director of the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center.

“We’re seeing cases in Westchester, the Bronx and Queens, lower Manhattan, and Brooklyn,” said Dr. Ho. “So it seems to be widespread. It’s not a single outbreak. “

The team also identified six cases of the variant that beat the UK, two infections with a variant identified in Brazil, and one case of the variant adopted in South Africa. The latter two have never been reported in New York City, said Dr. Ho.

University investigators have alerted New York state and city authorities as well as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said Dr. Ho. He and his colleagues plan to sequence about 100 viral genetic samples daily to monitor the increase in variants.

Other experts said the sudden appearance of coronavirus variants was worrying.

“Given the involvement of E484K or S477N, coupled with the fact that the New York area has strong immunity to the spring wave, this is definitely a good thing,” said Kristian Andersen, a virologist at the Scripps Research Institute in San Diego, who did not participated in the new research effort.

The E484K mutation has appeared independently in many different parts of the world, suggesting that it offers a significant benefit to the virus.

“Variants that have an advantage will increase in frequency pretty quickly, especially as the numbers decrease overall,” said Andrew Read, an evolutionary microbiologist at Penn State University.

The team of Dr. Ho reported in January that the monoclonal antibodies made by Eli Lilly and one of the monoclonal antibodies in a cocktail made by Regeneron are powerless against the variant identified in South Africa.

Several studies have now shown that variants containing the E484K mutation are less susceptible to vaccines than the original form of the virus. The mutation disrupts the activity of a class of antibodies that almost everyone makes, said Dr. Nut branch.

“People who have recovered from the coronavirus or who have been vaccinated are very likely to be able to fight off this variant, there is no doubt about that,” he said. But “they might get a little sick.”

They could also infect others and keep the virus floating around, which could delay herd immunity, he added.

However, other experts were a little more optimistic. “These things are a little less well controlled by vaccines, but they are no orders of magnitude less, which would scare me,” said Dr. Read.

As the virus evolves, the vaccines need to be tweaked, “but in the scheme of things this isn’t a huge concern compared to having a vaccine missing,” said Dr. Read. “I’d say the glass is three quarters full compared to where we were last year.”

Tags coronavirus, report, researchers, Spreading, Variant, York

Health

Moderna to start trials of Covid vaccine booster photographs for variant from South Africa

Post author By
Post date February 24, 2021

NY will begin offering shots to people with underlying health conditions this month

A health care worker gives a picture of Moderna COVID-19 to a woman at a pop-up vaccination site operated by SOMOS Community Care during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic in New York on January 29, 2021 Vaccine.

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Moderna announced on Wednesday that a new Covid-19 vaccine, which is said to offer better protection against the highly contagious variant of coronavirus that is widespread in South Africa, has been delivered to the National Institutes of Health.

The vaccine – which Moderna names mRNA-1273.351 – can be tested in an early clinical trial to see if it can be used as a booster against the South African strain, also known as B.1.351. Moderna has found that its current two-dose regimen produces a weaker immune response against the South African strain, although the company said the antibodies in patients remain above levels expected to protect against the virus.

“Moderna is committed to making as many updates as necessary to our vaccine until the pandemic is under control,” said the company’s CEO, Stephane Bancel, in a press release. “We hope to show that booster doses can be given at lower doses when needed, which will allow us to make many more doses available to the global community when needed in late 2021 and 2022.”

US health officials are increasingly concerned about new, emerging variants of the virus, particularly strain B.1.351, which has been shown to reduce the effectiveness of vaccines both in market and in development. Over the past few weeks, the White House Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Anthony Fauci, urged Americans to get vaccinated as soon as possible before potentially new and even more dangerous variants of the virus emerge.

As of Tuesday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention had identified 1,881 cases of variant B.1.1.7, which were first found in the UK. The US authorities said they had identified 46 cases of the strain B.1.351 from South Africa and five cases of P.1, a variant first discovered in Brazil. The more people become infected, the more likely it is that even more problematic mutations will occur, say medical experts.

On Monday, the Food and Drug Administration released updated guidelines that modified Covid-19 vaccines that work to protect against new, emerging variants may be approved without the need for lengthy clinical trials. The FDA would approve the new vaccine as an amendment to a company’s originally approved emergency filing, thereby expediting the regulatory review process.

Moderna first announced on January 25 that it was working on a booster shot to protect itself against the variant in South Africa.

The company announced on Wednesday that it is evaluating three approaches to increasing immunity. The first approach would use variant-specific booster vaccinations such as mRNA-1273.351, but at a lower dose than the original vaccine. The second would combine the original vaccine with a variant-specific vaccine into a single shot at 50 micrograms or less, Moderna said. The third would test a third shot of the original vaccine at a lower dose.

Moderna said it also plans to test the original vaccine and new booster shot as a two-dose regimen in people without coronavirus antibodies.

Separately, the company also announced that it is expected to produce up to 1.4 billion doses of Covid-19 vaccine by 2022. It has also raised its global base production estimate from 600 million cans to 700 million cans this year.

According to Moderna, the 1.4 billion doses in 2022 assume the vaccine will be given at its current level of 100 micrograms. If the vaccine turns out to be effective at a lower dose, the company could deliver up to 2.8 billion doses by 2022, the company said.

Moderna has signed a contract with the US government for 300 million cans. The company has shipped around 55 million cans to the US to date. The first 100 million cans are expected to be shipped to the US by the end of the first quarter of 2021, the second 100 million cans by the end of May 2021, and the third 100 million cans by the end of July 2021.

Tags Africa, booster, Covid, Moderna, shots, South, trials, Vaccine, Variant

Health

New California Variant Extra Contagious, Two Research Verify

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Post date February 24, 2021

New California Variant More Contagious, Two Studies Confirm

A variant, first discovered in California in December, is more contagious than previous forms of the coronavirus. Two new studies have shown concerns that emerging mutants like these could hamper the sharp decline in cases across the state and potentially elsewhere.

In one of the new studies, researchers found that the variant had spread rapidly in a neighborhood of San Francisco in the past few months. The other report confirmed that the variant has risen sharply across the state and revealed that it produces twice as many virus particles in a person’s body as other variants. This study also suggested that the variant can bypass the immune system – and vaccines – better than others.

“I wish I had better news for you – that this variant doesn’t matter at all,” said Dr. Charles Chiu, a virologist at the University of California at San Francisco. “But unfortunately we just follow science.”

None of the studies have yet been published in a scientific journal. And experts don’t know how much this variant is public health compared to others that are also spreading in California.

A variant called B.1.1.7 came to the US from the UK, where it quickly became the dominant form of the virus and overloaded hospitals there. Studies of UK medical records suggest that B.1.1.7 is not only more communicable, but also more lethal than previous variants.

Some experts said the new variant in California is of concern, but is unlikely to be as much of a burden as B.1.1.7.

“I’m becoming increasingly convinced that this one transmits more than anyone else in the field,” said William Hanage, an epidemiologist at Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health who was not involved in the research. “But there is no evidence that it is in the same stadium as B.1.1.7.”

Dr. Chiu accidentally stumbled upon the new variant for the first time. In December, he and other researchers in California were concerned about the discovery of B.1.1.7 in the UK. They began screening their samples from positive coronavirus tests in California and sequencing viral genomes to see if B.1.1.7 had made it to their state.

On New Year’s Eve, Dr. Chiu is shocked to find a previously unknown variant that made up a quarter of the samples he and his colleagues had collected. “I thought that was crazy,” he said.

It turned out that researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles discovered the same variant that soared to high levels in Southern California. Dr. Chiu announced his first finding and the Cedars-Sinai team went public two days later.

Since then, researchers have studied the new variant, known as B.1.427 / B.1.429, in more detail to determine its origin and track its spread. It has performed in 45 states and several other countries so far, including Australia, Denmark, Mexico, and Taiwan. But it has only launched in California so far.

It was initially unclear whether the variant was inherently more transferable than others, or whether it had risen sharply in California due to gatherings that became overarching events.

“Just by chance, poor wedding or choir practice can cause a large frequency difference,” said Joe DeRisi, co-president of the Chan Zuckerberg Biohub, who studied the spread of the variant.

In a new study that will be posted online shortly, Dr. Chiu and his colleagues received 2,172 virus samples from across the state between September and January. In early September, the researchers found no signs of B.1.427 / B.1.429. But by the end of January it had become the predominant variant in California. Dr. Chiu and his colleagues estimate that the cases caused by the variant now double every 18 days.

Dr. Chiu and his colleagues reviewed the medical records of 308 cases of Covid-19 in San Francisco and found that a greater percentage of people had died from the new variant than others. However, this result could be a statistical coincidence: there were only 12 deaths in the group, so the difference in deaths from one subgroup to another in a larger sample may not apply.

Updated

Apr. 23, 2021, 8:18 p.m. ET

The researchers also conducted experiments in the laboratory to find evidence that the new variant had a biological benefit. In one study, they showed that it was at least 40 percent more effective than previous variants at infecting human cells. When measuring the genetic material of swabs used for coronavirus testing, the researchers found that people infected with the variant produce a viral load twice as high as other variants.

The study also found that the new variant can bypass the immune system better than other variants. Antibodies from people who had recovered from infections with other variants were less effective at blocking the new variant in the laboratory. The same was true when the researchers used blood serum from people who had been vaccinated.

Still, the effect of the variant on immunity appears to be much less than that caused by a variant from South Africa called B.1.351. Dr. Chiu said it was not clear whether the vaccines used against B.1.427 / B.1.429 will be less effective.

“If we can get enough people vaccinated, we can deal with these variants simply because we don’t have ongoing transmission,” he said.

In a separate study that has not yet been published, Dr. DeRisi and his colleagues are carefully investigating how the variant is spreading in the Mission District, a predominantly Latin American neighborhood in San Francisco.

When examining samples in late November, the researchers found that 16 percent of the coronaviruses belonged to B.1.427 / B.1.429. After sequencing 630 genomes in January, they found that they made up 53 percent.

The researchers also looked at the distribution of this and other variants in 326 households. They found that people had a 35 percent chance of getting infected if someone had B.1.427 / B.1.429 in their home. If the person was infected with another variant, the rate was only 26 percent.

“What we see is a modest but significant difference,” said Dr. DeRisi.

Dr. Chiu said the San Francisco study provided a microcosm of how the variant has spread across the state. “The data they have from the mission district really supports our data and vice versa,” he said.

Dr. However, Harvard-based Hanage is not convinced that the variant poses a major threat. Every time B.1.1.7 appeared in a new country, it quickly exploded. In contrast, the variant discovered in California seems to have slowly gained dominance.

Dr. Chiu and his colleagues were able to estimate when B.1.427 / B.1.429 arose by comparing the mutations that have occurred in the viruses since they separated from their common ancestor. This analysis pointed to late spring. If that’s correct, it means the variant may have lurked at extremely low levels in California for four months or more.

“It’s not as big a deal as the others,” said Dr. Hanage. He speculates that if scientists sequence more coronavirus genomes elsewhere, they will find more of these moderately fast-spreading mutants. “Maybe there are variants everywhere, and we only see them where sequencing happens,” he said.

We may soon have new insights into how seriously these new variants should be taken. B.1.1.7 didn’t arrive in California until early December, and although it has doubled about every 12 days, it’s still about 2 percent of the coronaviruses in the state.

Now California is becoming a kind of virus cage match between the two variants. “My suspicion is that the B.1.1.7 will win,” said Dr. Hanage.

Dr. However, Chiu thinks it is possible that B.1.427 / B.1.429 will suppress the newcomer and continue to dominate the state.

“We’ll find out in the next few weeks,” he said.

Tags California, confirm, Contagious, Studies, Variant

Business

South Africa Covid variant detected in first New York affected person

Post author By
Post date February 21, 2021

NY Gov. Cuomo holds a press briefing as state prepares to distribute Covid vaccine

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo speaks out on Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) on November 15, 2020 at Riverside Church in Manhattan, New York City, United States.

Andy Kelly | Reuters

Governor Andrew Cuomo said Sunday that a variant of Covid-19, first identified in South Africa, has reached New York.

The governor said at a news conference that the mutation, which experts fear may be resistant to some vaccines, was discovered in a resident of Nassau County. The announcement comes days after a Connecticut resident tested positive for the variant in a New York hospital.

“It is more important than ever for New Yorkers to stay vigilant, wear masks, wash hands, and stay socially aloof. We are currently in a race between our immunity and those variants that are actively trying to reproduce and we’ll just do it. ” You can win this race if we stay smart and disciplined, “said Cuomo.

The South African variant, known as B.1.351, was first discovered in the US in late January and has been found in at least 10 states, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 21 infections have been reported in the country.

The mutation is one of three strains of very high concern monitored by the agency, along with variants that were first identified in the UK and Japan.

The CDC has said preliminary evidence from untested publications suggests the Moderna vaccine may be “less effective” against the South African variant. It was indicated that further studies are needed.

The Moderna vaccine is one of two federally approved vaccines in the United States. Three other vaccines are currently in clinical trials.

Cuomo’s announcement came as the number of new cases and hospitalizations continued to decline in New York and across the country. Some public health experts have warned that the new mutations that are believed to be more transmissible could reverse these trends.

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Tags Africa, Covid, detected, Patient, South, Variant, York

Health

U.Ok. Virus Variant Is Most likely Deadlier, Scientists Say

Post author By
Post date February 13, 2021

U.K. Virus Variant Is Probably Deadlier, Scientists Say

LONDON – UK government scientists are increasingly realizing that the variant of coronavirus, first discovered in the UK, is more deadly than the original virus. This is a devastating trend that highlights the serious risks of this new phase of the pandemic.

The scientists said last month that there was a “realistic possibility” that the variant would be more deadly. Now a new document states that it is “likely” that the variant is associated with an increased risk of hospitalizations and death.

The UK government has not made the updated results public. These are based on about twice as many studies as their earlier assessment and include more deaths due to Covid-19 cases caused by the new variant B.1.1.7. The document was posted on a government website on Friday and was reviewed at a government advisors meeting the previous day.

The variant is known in 82 countries, including the USA. American scientists recently estimated that it was spreading rapidly there, doubling about every 10 days, and said it could be the dominant version of the virus in the United States by March.

“The calculation of when we can lift restrictions has to be affected,” said Simon Clarke, Associate Professor of Cell Microbiology at the University of Reading, of the new findings. “It provides additional evidence that this variant is more deadly than the one we looked at last time.”

Most Covid-19 cases, including those caused by the new variant, are not fatal. And government scientists relied on studies that looked at a small fraction of the total deaths, making it difficult to determine exactly how much increased risk might be associated with the new variant.

Updated

Apr. 13, 2021 at 10:00 PM ET

However, the strongest studies they relied on estimated that the variant could be 30 to 70 percent more deadly than the original virus.

And the government scientists, who are part of a committee known as the Advisory Group on New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats, wrote that the latest studies have helped them control factors like the impact of congested hospitals.

This enabled “increasing confidence in the association” of the new variant “with increased disease severity”.

The variant is thought to be 30 to 50 percent more transmissible than the original virus, although some scientists now believe it is even more contagious. The first sample of it was collected in the south east of England in September and quickly became the dominant version of the virus in the UK. It now accounts for more than 90 percent of cases in many parts of the country.

As it spread, hospitals have been overwhelmed by the pace of new infections. Doctors and nurses treated almost twice as many hospital patients as they did at the height of last year. A strict lockdown has since slashed the number of new coronavirus cases in the UK.

As an example of the growing evidence of the variant’s lethality, government scientists cited a study by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. In January, this study looked at the deaths of 2,583 people, 384 of whom are believed to have had cases of Covid-19 caused by the new variant. The study estimated that people infected with the new variant had a 35 percent higher risk of death.

An updated study by the same group relied on 3,382 deaths, of which 1,722 were believed to be from the new variant. This study suggested that the variant could be associated with a 71 percent higher risk of death.

Professor Clarke said the new findings confirmed the UK government’s decision to raise an alert about the variant in December and then release evidence last month that it was potentially more deadly. Some outside scientists initially rejected the warnings.

“You didn’t withhold the data,” said Professor Clarke. “They were very open about how insecure things were.”

Tags Deadlier, Scientists, Variant, Virus

Business

Vaccine ramp up most likely not sufficient to handle UK virus variant

Post author By
Post date February 12, 2021

Vaccine ramp up probably not enough to manage UK virus variant

An increase in vaccinations in the coming weeks alone may not be enough to contain the spread of a coronavirus variant, which was first reported in the UK in December and has now emerged in the US, said Scott Gottlieb, former commissioner for food and drug delivery.

The emergence of variants could complicate efforts to reopen the economy in the United States, which, according to Johns Hopkins University, had at least 475,000 virus deaths more than any other country.

The UK first reported the strain known as B117 to the World Health Organization in December, and now there are 971 cases in 37 US states, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“Right now they are shipping 11 million cans a week in states. That will likely increase,” said Gottlieb, who served as FDA chief under former President Donald Trump from 2017 to 2019, in CNBC’s “The News with Shepard Smith”. on Thursday. “So we’re increasing the vaccination rate across the country. Well, will it be fast enough to get a backstop against B117 – probably not by itself.”

Gottlieb said he doesn’t think travel restrictions could stop the spread of the B117 variant because it can often be too late. A “seasonal setback” in the form of the arrival of spring and summer could help reduce the spread of B117, said Gottlieb, a director of Pfizer, whose Covid vaccine is sold in the United States

He said that hopefully a combination of this and increasing vaccinations will include the variant in most parts of the country, although there may be hotspots in southern parts of California and Florida.

Tags manage, ramp, Vaccine, Variant, Virus