The US Army has created a coronavirus vaccine that could prove to be effective against multiple variants of SARS-CoV-2 and even previous SARS viruses. This is huge news. The vaccine has cleared phase 1 trials and is entering phase 2. It’s being tested against Omicron. The work on this vaccine was done at Walter Reed.
The White House has paused student loan payments through May 1st. Interest rates are at 0% during the moratorium period. This is the second extension of the moratorium.
Here’s a useful and informative fire diagram:
Do you know the different parts of a fire? This is an important concept captured in this diagram (by OSU), to help clearly identify the different parts of a fire. Heading fires typically have faster rates of spread while backing fires will have slower rates of spread. #RxFire pic.twitter.com/eD4Im90kQM
— Oregon State University Extension Fire Program (@OSUFireProgram) December 22, 2021
Storm shelters are still saving lives. A Kentucky family survived a recent tornado hit by using one built many decades ago. You definitely can’t put a price on your family’s safety. Pre-fabricated shelters can also be relatively affordable.
The world has 278.2 million COVID cases. The world has gained 5 million cases in the last week. There have been nearly 5.4 million deaths in total. The US has had a cumulative 52.6 million cases—over 854,000 cases were added in the last week. Over 834,000 Americans have died—about 10,000 in the last week. The US added 232,000 new cases Wednesday, and over 115,000 by mid-day Thursday. The US is still leading global daily case gain followed by India, Brazil, the UK, and Russia. Daily cases rise in the US is extremely high:
U.S. COVID update: Daily cases rising at fastest rate since pandemic began
– New cases: 190,190
– Average: 153,792 (+10,819)
– States reporting: 47/50
– In hospital: 68,290 (+1,099)
– In ICU: 16,477 (+224)
– New deaths: 2,104
– Average: 1,396 (+54)Data: https://t.co/YDZSbYO7l7
— BNO Newsroom (@BNODesk) December 22, 2021
Some big cities in the US are hitting the highest daily case gains on record since the pandemic started:
New York reports 28,924 new coronavirus cases, the biggest one-day increase on record, of which 17,221 are in New York City
— BNO Newsroom (@BNODesk) December 22, 2021
The FDA has given emergency use authorization to Pfizer for an oral antiviral for COVID. Paxlovid is expected to work well against Omicron. The only problem is that there isn’t enough of it to go around. There isn’t yet enough production to match the need for it. We also have the problem of testing in time to utilize it. We need therapeutics like this because monoclonal antibodies are no longer effective against the newer variants:
FDA authorizes Pfizer #covid19 antiviral drug Paxlovid pic.twitter.com/JVhTQSXytJ
— Meg Tirrell (@megtirrell) December 22, 2021
There is more data to support the notion that Omicron is less virulent than other variants. A word of caution, though–it may not cause as much morbidity or mortality (and time will show us whether this is true or not) but if it’s much more transmissible than other variants it’s still going to cause mayhem by infecting large numbers of people:
The risk of needing to stay in hospital for patients with the Omicron variant of COVID-19 is 40% to 45% lower than for patients with the Delta variant, according to research by London’s Imperial College published on Wednesday. https://t.co/SCF1S8Bxuq
— Reuters Health (@Reuters_Health) December 23, 2021
COVID case gain around the world is distressing, but there’s good news on the pandemic front as well:
You know it’s a good day in the pandemic when:
—The 1st anti-Covid pill is cleared
—More indications that Omicron is associated with less severe illness and tends to come down from its big surge as quickly as it ascends
—The 1st pan-coronavirus vaccine is ready for Phase 2 trials— Eric Topol (@EricTopol) December 22, 2021
Omicron might be causing steep case rises but also precipitous drops:
Steep epidemic curve in cities where #Omicron surged suggests we may be missing a lot of mild or subclinical infection, and we’re measuring an epidemic as it starts to peak and not at its outset. In U.S. wastewater data already suggests much more infection than we’re diagnosing. pic.twitter.com/EUIfUbCA0a
— Scott Gottlieb, MD (@ScottGottliebMD) December 22, 2021
There was a comment question in the previous roundup about case statistics—I thought this might be a helpful chart for folks:
Latest CDC data by vaccine status:
Unvaccinated: 451 cases per 100k
Vaccinated: 134 cases per 100k
Boosted: 48 cases per 100kUnvaccinated: 6.1 deaths per 100k
Vaccinated: 0.5 deaths per 100k
Boosted: 0.1 deaths per 100k— Ryan Struyk (@ryanstruyk) December 20, 2021
The White House plans to help to get more tests into the hands of more Americans. This is desperately needed, especially if people want to be able to take advantage of therapeutics for COVID that require early identification of cases:
500 million free rapid antigen tests to be distributed on request starting next month in the US. A start (finally), but billions are needed to help prevent spreadhttps://t.co/IZFDrVALuR by @SherylNYT pic.twitter.com/UjllN5no6W
— Eric Topol (@EricTopol) December 21, 2021
Source
News roundup for Fri, Dec 24, 2021 – The Prepared is written by Stephanie Arnold for theprepared.com
