Computer programs are written in code, which comes in many forms. At the lowest level, theres machine code and assembly, while higher-level languages like C and Python aim to be more human-readable. However, the natural world has source code too, in the form of DNA and RNA strings that contain the code for the building blocks of life. [Bert] decided to take a look at the mRNA source code of Tozinameran, the COVID-19 vaccine developed by BioNTech and Pfizer.
The analysis is simple enough for the general reader, while nonetheless explaining some highly complex concepts at the cutting edge of biology. From codon substitutions for efficiency and the -base substitution to avoid the vaccine being destroyed by the immune system, to the complex initialisation string required at the start of the RNA sequence, [Bert] clearly explains the clever coding hacks that made the vaccine possible. Particularly interesting to note is the Prolase substitution, a technique developed in 2017. This allows the production of coronavirus spike proteins in isolation of the whole virus, in order to safely prime the immune system.
Its a great primer and we can imagine it might inspire some to delve further into the rich world of genetics and biology. Weve featured other cutting edge stories on COVID-19 too; [Dan Maloney] took a look at how CRISPR techniques are helping with the testing effort. If theres one thing the 2020 pandemic has shown, its humanitys ability to rapidly develop new technology in the face of a crisis.
Flanked by a police escort, a paramedic emergency vehicle, its hazard lights flashing, speeds through town towards the main hospital.
An emergency Christmas delivery handed to medical staff.
A small green refrigerated bag then hurried inside the Papa Giovanni XXIII hospital, followed by two police officers.
The COVID-19 vaccine has arrived in the northern Italian city of Bergamo.
This city, which was devastated by the pandemic, can learn to breathe again.
It is early days of course, but the vaccination process has begun.
The symbolic first dose given to the city's head of doctors Guido Marinoni - looking after patients and the most vulnerable, as well as their medical carers - is a priority here.
The vaccination photo opportunities are a far cry from the near chaos that engulfed the emergency rooms of the hospital and shocked the world in March.
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As a team, covered head to toe in PPE, we had absolutely no idea what to expect.
Back then, nobody knew anything really and nobody had seen emergency rooms and intensive care units with patients lined up connected to ventilators, slowly dying in front of our eyes.
Back then if you were unfortunate enough to be admitted to the ICU, you had, at best, a 50/50 chance of survival.
I remember working that out in our car, having read the daily and weekly mortality figures published by the Italian health ministry.
That was then. The world has now been completely enveloped by the virus, and the world is fighting back.
After the most difficult 10 months in medical living memory, the frontline staff who have fought and survived can relish the future.
They are exhausted for sure. But they can now see the light. For so, so long there was nothing but darkness.
Constant shifts. Constant death. Constant feelings of personal failure.
"Now we realise that maybe we are not enough," Lorenzo Grazioli, an intensive care anaesthetist, told me at the time. It scared the hell out of me.
Outside I remember just talking to myself.
Basically, in despair, I said if a hospital as rich and well-resourced as the Papa Giovanni is overrun - what happens to the world, what happens to the UK? I had never felt so utterly helpless and scared for everyone I knew.
As I say, that was then.
Now there is a vaccine rollout and one of the first to get it in Bergamo is Dr Roberto Cosentini, the head of emergency care, who - with perhaps the most cool of cool heads - oversaw what looked like a warzone without bombs and bullets.
Roberto is a friend now. We don't speak much but we don't need to. His dream of a chance to relish a future where the virus can be beaten is being achieved.
I can't really explain how much I feel for him and his staff. They let us into the hospital to send a message of warning to the world even though they were losing the fight. No professional wants to do that.
But they knew they had to warn everyone.
He now hopes we can all put this behind us.
He told us: "I think today is a historical day for human beings because it's the first big step to win the battle against the virus.
"Before we only had to react to the safety measures, up and down according to the measures, but now we have the hope to turn the page and think of the future."
The beautiful ancient city of Bergamo towers above its modern sibling. Both the old and new cities were engulfed by the virus and thousands died here.
The survivors of this virus storm can now walk through the historic cobbled streets, stopping to pick up a takeaway coffee and sit in the extremely quiet and socially-distanced Venetian squares to soak up the winter sun.
In March I met Michele and Serena, both in their 70s and both terrified. They hunkered down in isolation to see it out. They are much more relaxed now. The dream of a vaccine realised.
"The people of Bergamo are known in Italy as one of the most hardworking and passionate people, one of the mottos here is 'Mola Mia' (never give up) and the people of Bergamo have not given up," they say.
"They have reinvented themselves."
Bergamo, Italy and most of Europe are still struggling with coronavirus of course, but the vaccine programme now being rolled out across the continent is at least giving space for the countries' leaders to plan for the future.
Giorgio Gori, the popular mayor of Bergamo, who imposed the original city lockdown and brought his two daughters back home from the UK because of the British government's failure to lockdown or take the virus seriously, is now reinvigorated.
"It's a real turning point, because now we can actually think of the exit point for this pandemic, we can plan a recovery time, we can plan to restart," he says.
"We know we will probably have to wait a few months and probably we will have to face a third wave, but now we have big hope - we see the light at the end of the tunnel."
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Finally he can see a future without the curse of COVID-19 hanging over him and his city.
Where there was fear and grief, a new sense of optimism is sweeping across Europe and the world.
Finally 2020 has given everyone something to celebrate.
In comparison, the entire month of November saw about 36,964 deaths.
The death toll comes on the heels of several brutal months, with Covid-19 ravaging communities from coast to coast, crippling hospital systems and prompting new widespread restrictions.
"We very well might see a post-seasonal -- in the sense of Christmas, New Years -- surge," Dr. Anthony Fauci said on CNN's "State of the Union" Sunday morning, pointing to holiday travel and private gatherings taking place despite the advice of health experts.
The nation's top infectious disease expert described the potential rise in cases as a "surge upon a surge," telling CNN's Dana Bash, "If you look at the slope, the incline of cases that we've experienced as we've gone into the late fall and soon to be early winter, it is really quite troubling."
This is the 26th consecutive day that the US has remained above 100,000 current hospitalizations.
All of the five highest days for hospitalizations have been in the last week.
Another surge of cases and hospitalizations will, inevitably, mean more deaths -- on top of an already devastating death toll.
"When you're dealing with a baseline of 200,000 new cases a day and about 2,000 deaths per day, with the hospitalizations over 120,000, we are really at a very critical point," Fauci said.
"As we get into the next few weeks," he added, "it might actually get worse."
Fauci's comments Sunday came as the US surpassed 19.1 million coronavirus cases, yet another milestone for the pandemic, coming just over 11 months after the first case was recorded in the US in late January.
As of 8 p.m. ET Sunday, Johns Hopkins University has reported 125,041 new cases and 1,160 reported deaths.
"The projections are just nightmarish," said Dr. Peter Hotez, an infectious disease specialist at the Baylor College of Medicine. "People can still save the lives of their loved ones by practicing that social distancing and masks. And remember, vaccines are around the corner."
Vaccine rollout slow in some places, expert says
Nearly 2 million Covid-19 vaccine doses have been administered in the US, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and more than 9.5 million doses have been distributed.
Asked about the apparent slow rollout of vaccines, Fauci told CNN Sunday that large, comprehensive vaccine programs with a new vaccine start slow before gaining momentum.
"I'm pretty confident that as we gain more and more momentum, as we transition from December to January and then February to March, I believe we will catch up with the projection," he said.
Dr. Esther Choo, a professor of emergency medicine at Oregon Health & Science University, explained that vaccine distribution is "just a very complicated thing."
"At every step, there's complexity and there's possibility for delay, whether it's individual state planning, allocation, training, supply of vaccine, storage... there (are) just so many factors at this stage," Choo said.
"We need to be prepared for the fact that it is going to be a slow rollout in many places and that it will not change our behaviors or necessarily the trajectory of the pandemic in this country in the short term," Choo said.
A number of experts have warned Americans not to let their guard down as vaccinations begin and to continue wearing masks, social distancing, avoiding crowds and gatherings, and regularly washing their hands.
It likely won't be until summer that vaccines are widely available and begin to make a meaningful impact on the pandemic's course, officials have said. Fauci estimates about 70% to 85% of the population needs to get vaccinated against Covid-19 for the country to achieve herd immunity.
Expert: Testing requirements won't help control Covid-19 variant spread
Passengers must have had a negative PCR or antigen test within 72 hours of boarding a flight from the UK to the US, along with documentation of their laboratory results. Airlines will be required to confirm the test prior to the flight.
The third case of the variant first identified in the UK has been detected in Ottawa, Canada, a press release from the Ontario government said Sunday.
The case is a person who recently traveled from the UK, according to the release. That individual is now in self-isolation.
The two previous cases that were reported on Saturday have since been found to have had contact with a recent traveler from the UK, the release said.
One expert says the new testing requirements for travelers into the US have not been implemented quickly enough to be effective against a reported variant.
"It makes sense that for any place that's experiencing a regional spike in cases that we put new measures in place," emergency medicine physician Dr. Richina Bicette told CNN. "But if they're trying to make sure that the virus isn't imported to the United States, these measures are going to have no effect on that whatsoever."
CNN's Virginia Langmaid, Pete Muntean and Hollie Silverman contributed to this report.
We gather today to mourn the 150-year-old restaurant that served up platters of fried chicken and creamed corn to Abilene, Kan. To bid farewell to the New Orleans cafe that was a destination for huge crab omelets and endless conversation. To raise one last glass to the tavern in Cambridge, Mass., where the regulars arrived at 8 a.m. and the Austin diner where Janis Joplin nearly sang the neon lights off the walls.
They were local landmarks watering holes, shops and haunts that weathered recessions and gentrification, world wars and the Great Depression, only to succumb this year to the economic ravages of the coronavirus. This is their obituary.
Thousands of businesses have closed during the pandemic, but the demise of so many beloved hangouts cuts especially deep. They were woven into the identity of big cities and small towns, their walls lined with celebrity photos and Best Of awards. Some had been around a century. Others, like the Maam Sir Filipino restaurant in Los Angeles, needed just a few years to win the hearts of their neighborhoods.
Their closures have left blank spaces across the country as owners liquidate their memorabilia and wistful customers leave social-media tributes recalling first dates and marriage proposals. And there are new worries: If these institutions could not survive, what can? And who will be left standing, to hold our memories and knit our communities together, when this pandemic is over?
If you ever went to the Cantab Lounge at 8 in the morning, you would meet regulars named Hoopy or Ralphie Moneybags or Growling John or Illinois, guys who showed up every morning, as if they had a time clock to punch.
This was before Cambridge, Mass., became a tech boomtown, home to a 300,000-square-foot Google satellite office complete with decorative canoes and a miniature indoor putting green.
Back then this stretch of Massachusetts Avenue was genuinely grungy. The Cantab took only cash. The bar was always sticky, and you wouldnt want to use the bathroom. In a 1996 Senate debate, the Republican candidate, Bill Weld, held up the establishment as an argument against public assistance, saying, They get the check, go down to the Cantab in the morning, and drink it away. (The competition groused that his comment had been good for the Cantabs business.)
But if you wandered in there on the right night, you could find a poetry slam or bluegrass night or Little Joe Cook and the Thrillers. Ben Afflecks father used to work there, serving Budweisers to off-duty postal workers. Even the barflies were somehow uniquely Cambridge; Hoopy, for example, carried crossword puzzles in his inside pocket, and gave his profession as solipsist.
In July, when the Cantabs owner, Richard Fitzgerald, announced he was putting it up for sale after 50 years, a howl of distress went up from that old, scruffy bohemian Cambridge. Mr. Fitzgerald, known as Fitzy, is hoping to find a new buyer to reopen the place in the summer lets hope in its old, sticky style.
Ellen Barry
New Orleans
The bars and nightclubs that have shut down across New Orleans this year account for an infinity of lost time: gabbing over beers and the remains of a banh mi at the Lost Love Lounge, lingering after the friend of a friends band played at the Saturn Bar, giving up a further pub crawl for the siren song of the Circle Bar.
Still, as one ages, the places that were once just for mornings after become the hangouts themselves. Such was the case with Cake Cafe and Bakery, which sat on a bright yellow corner in the Marigny neighborhood.
On Saturday and Sunday mornings the line ran out the door, people waiting for French toast, biscuits and gravy and crab omelets the size of phone books; you could add a cupcake for a dollar.
The staff knew most of the customers on sight, except during carnival season when the tourists flocked. By that time those in the know had already ordered a king cake, in competition with the best in the city. It closed in June.
My young children will never know the pleasure of a long night of aimless conversation at the Lost Love Lounge. But they did know long mornings at Cake Cafe, which may be the first hangout they loved and lost.
Campbell Robertson
There was an adage everyone knew in Spokane, Wash.: If you cant find it anywhere else, the White Elephant will have it.
As superstores and Amazon devoured the landscape of American retail, the White Elephant hung on, a stubbornly independent small-box store. Founded in 1946, the prices were still marked in black Sharpie, and shoppers paid a dime to ride the mechanical elephant out front. It was a go-to retail destination for toys, camping tents and fishing lures. People lined up for Cabbage Patch dolls and Teddy Ruxpin bears. Children zoomed Matchbox cars around the aisles.
No more. The White Elephant, a place woven into many childhoods across eastern Washington State, was a casualty of 2020.
When the Covid hit, that just made it a definite thing we thought we ought to just go ahead and call it, said Mary Conley, whose husband, John R. Conley Sr., started the business as a war-surplus store. He died in 2017.
In June, shoppers strapped on face masks and lined up for one final day of bargain-hunting as the Conleys liquidated their inventory and got ready to sell their two storefronts.
Jack Healy
The warnings about the fries were as legendary as the fries themselves.
The large is huge!
Order it with friends.
Seriously, you cant eat it by yourself.
The Original Hot Dog Shop had hot dog right there in the name, but it was the fries perfectly cut, fried twice in peanut oil to extra crispness, served in a massive pile in a paper basket, with side cups of beef gravy or cheese product that everyone talked about.
No one actually called it by its full name. Maybe the Original. But it was usually just the O. Or especially among my high school friends and the University of Pittsburgh students in the citys Oakland neighborhood the Dirty O.
Dec. 28, 2020, 1:38 a.m. ET
The place was a favorite of Michael Chabon, a Pitt grad whose first two novels are set in the city. In his memories, he told me, its 2 a.m. and Ive been hanging out with friends and drinking, and were all stumbling through Oakland, which is completely dark, and nothing is open except this one shining beacon of the O.
Decades later, he can still hear the chirping video games and picture the late-night security guard glowering at a diverse cross-section of Pittsburgh. In my memory its always freezing cold outside and really hot inside, and this sort of miasma of grease from the frying baskets is just hanging over everything.
The Pitt student newspaper reported that when the O closed in April, the owners served up one more giant order of fries, donating 35,000 pounds of potatoes to charity.
Scott Dodd
Los Angeles
When Charles Olalia decided to open a Filipino restaurant in Los Angeless hip Silver Lake district, he wished to showcase my countrys food and vibe: beautiful, boisterous, loving to a wide audience, he said.
It was the full dining experience of what Filipino culture is, said Mr. Olalia, 37, who immigrated to the United States when he was 20.
Maam Sir opened in 2018 to rave reviews for its creative renditions of signature Filipino dishes, like sizzling pork sisig and oxtail kare-kare.
Its tropical dcor and festive atmosphere drew crowds of Filipino-Americans like Cheryl Balolong, 41, who grew up visiting traditional Filipino cafeteria-style joints in strip malls, picking dishes from display cases, eating and leaving.
Maam Sir was different, she said. It was a place where we felt proud to bring friends who werent from our culture. When Ms. Balolong got married, her bachelorette party was held at Maam Sir.
Then the pandemic struck. By August, Mr. Olalia shut the place down. Day after day putting food in a box and seeing an empty dining room, I was getting farther and farther away from what the restaurant really was and why I built it, he recalled.
Miriam Jordan
Austin, Texas
For generations of University of Texas students, a stick-to-your ribs meal at Threadgills was about as close to moms kitchen as one could get. And with live music most nights, every dining experience also felt like a party.
The place had been a fixture in Austin since Franklin Roosevelt was in the White House. Its original owner, Kenneth Threadgill, a former bootlegger and well-known yodeler, was the first post-Prohibition licensed seller of beer in the county.
Threadgills began hosting live music in the 1940s, with local hillbilly blues artists paid in rounds of beer. U.T. students flocked there, including a rebellious undergrad named Janis Joplin, who made regular open-mic appearances.
By the time Eddie Wilson bought Threadgills in 1977, it had been closed for a few years and fallen into disrepair. It reopened in 1981, and became home to the Waller Creek Boys, Jimmy Dale Gilmore and other Austin musical legends.
Threadgills was the spot where you wooed a first date with chicken-fried steak and pecan pie. It was where you celebrated Longhorn victories and mourned losses.
Sandra Wilson said she and her husband were heartbroken over the closure in April, which left 50 employees without jobs. But after years of rising rents, Covid-19 made it nearly impossible to go on.
Jamie Stockwell
Pikeville, Ky.
In rural America, far from airports and skyscrapers and rush hours, certain types of restaurants are hard to come by, which makes them all the more delightful when you discover them.
The Blue Raven, in Pikeville, Ky., was one of those. It would have been a great restaurant anywhere, but in Pikeville, people knew they were especially lucky to have it.
The Blue Raven was effortlessly classy. It was the kind of place you could take a third date without seeming like you were trying too hard. And it somehow managed to combine eastern Kentuckys small-town charm with a modern, fusion menu that rotated with the whims of its workers.
One of its last dishes before it closed in May: miso chicken pot pie with hot sauce whipped cream.
Will Wright
Coral Gables, Fla.
Ortanique on the Mile was where locals took their out-of-town relatives to try someplace that tasted like Miami. The walls were bright. The mojitos were among the best in town. The food was the cuisine of the sun, Cindy Hutson, the chef and co-owner, liked to say.
West Indian-style bouillabaisse. Mussels steamed in a spicy broth of Red Stripe beer. A beef tenderloin that Delius Shirley, Ms. Hutsons partner and co-owner, recommended to customers like this: If you dont like this steak, Ill buy it for you. (They liked it.)
Their first restaurant, Normas on the Beach named after Mr. Shirleys mother, Norma Shirley, the Julia Child of Jamaica was on Miami Beachs touristy Lincoln Road. They moved the restaurant to Coral Gables 21 years ago and renamed it.
We did parties for a kids First Communion and then when they graduated high school, Ms. Hutson said. Then we did a party for that same kid when they graduated college. And then we did a party when they got engaged.
All that came to an end this year. I cried and cried at first, Ms. Hutson said. But it turned into a happy cry from the outpouring of response from the neighborhood.
Patricia Mazzei
Abilene, Kan.
The Brookville Hotel looked like a relic from Kansas dusty frontier days the white clapboard facade with black lettering, blue-and-white china, charming old patterned wallpaper and curved bistro chairs in the dining room. The food hardly changed in decades, either: fried chicken, sweet-and-sour coleslaw, creamed corn, biscuits and bowls of vanilla ice cream, family-style platters that materialized on the table in generous portions, as if by magic.
But the pandemic was too much for the hotel, which was really a restaurant and a 150-year-old institution along the interstate in the tiny city of Abilene, Kan. Drop-in customers had dwindled, along with buses packed with tourists headed to the Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library and Museum nearby. By early October, the Martin family, proprietors since the 1890s, called it quits.
It is with a very heavy heart that we must announce that the Covid, and the lack of traffic, has forced us to close, the owners wrote on Facebook.
Julie Bosman
The Kansas City, Mo., culinary scene is most often associated with barbecue, but another place caught my eye that was more fine dining than smoked meats.
The Rieger, housed in an early 20th-century hotel of the same name, produced delightful plates of Midwestern favorites with a chefs flair.
There was chicken with barbecue sauce, but the chicken was done in the French ballotine style. The pork tenderloin sandwich was fried in a light batter and brightened with red onions pickled with habaneros. There was an ode to French onion soup that was packed with pork confit and topped with crispy pork skin.
The basement housed a speakeasy, Manifesto, that took reservations through text messages and served craft cocktails.
The Rieger opened in 2010 and quickly became a local staple. But the pandemic would prove too much, and the restaurant announced its closure on Oct. 16 in an Instagram post.
Before that happened, Howard Hanna, who was the chef and owner, turned the Rieger into a community kitchen that served more than 85,000 free meals.
John Eligon
Two studies published yesterday demonstrate that COVID-19 immune responses last as long as 8 months, although the authors focus on different reasons.
The first study, published in Science Immunology, followed a small cohort of Australians from day 4 to day 242 after infection. All patients demonstrated the presence of memory B cellsimmune cells that "remember" viral proteins and can trigger rapid production of antibodies when re-exposed to the virusas long as 8 months after initial infection.
The second study investigated antibody responses in 58 confirmed COVID-19 patients in South Korea 8 months after asymptomatic or mild SARS-CoV-2 infection, finding high rates of serum antibodies. These results, published in Emerging Infectious Diseases, are contradictory to both the first study's antibody data and previous research that showed antibodies waning after 20 days, but the authors suggest that variations in immunoassay test characteristics and manufacturing may be responsible for the difference.
For the Australian study, researchers obtained blood samples from 25 confirmed COVID-19 patients with a range of disease severities and 36 healthy control patients from March to September, evaluating each patient's antibody status and levels of virus-specific immune cells.
The study authors found that by day 6 post-infection, all patients showed immunoglobulin (Ig) G antibodies for the viral receptor-binding domaina protein on the viral surface that binds to cell receptors, allowing entry and infectionand the nucleocapsid protein, the protective protein shell of the virus. Patient IgG levels began declining 20 days after symptom onset.
In contrast, the study authors found that memory B cell levels continued to rise up to 150 days post-infection and remained detectable 240 days post-symptom onset, suggesting that patient immune systems were primed to respond to reinfection. Because of their extended presence, the cells may be a better indicator of long-term immune response than serum antibodies, the authors say.
The study results provide hope that vaccines will generate a similar duration of protection, and the authors say cellular immunity may explain why there are few documented cases of reinfection with SARS-CoV-2.
"These results are important because they show, definitively, that patients infected with the COVID-19 virus do in fact retain immunity against the virus and the disease," said senior author Menno van Zelm, PhD, in a Monash University news release yesterday.
"This has been a black cloud hanging over the potential protection that could be provided by any COVID-19 vaccine and gives real hope that, once a vaccine or vaccines are developed, they will provide long-term protection."
In the second study, the researchers measured SARS-CoV-2specific antibodies using four commercial immunoassay tests in isolated patients at a Seoul National University Hospital community treatment center from Mar 5 to Apr 9. Three of the four assays showed high seropositivity rates (69% to 91.4%; P < 0.01), in contrast to yet another earlier study showing that asymptomatic patients become seronegative by 2 to 3 months post-infection.
"Rates differed according to immunoassay methods or manufacturers, thereby explaining differences in rates between the studies," the authors wrote. For instance, they said, a July BMJ study reported chemiluminescent immunoassay tests had 97.8% IgG or IgM sensitivity, whereas enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay tests only had 84.3%.
Virus neutralizing activityessential for protection from reinfectionwas detected in only 53.4% of study participants at 8 months post-infection, considerably lower than the rate of positivity for immunoassays.
"Despite concerns of waning immunity, appropriate immunoassays can detect antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 at 8 months after infection in most asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic persons," the authors concluded.
BEIJING (AP) Police in Shanghai say they have detained a suspect in the case of the death by possible poisoning of the billionaire founder of a Chinese video game company that makes films based on the popular science fiction novel The Three-Body Problem.
Lin Qi, 39, died on Christmas Day after being hospitalized, according to his company, Yoozoo Games Co., also known as Youzu Interactive.
LONDON (AP) The head of drugmaker AstraZeneca, which is developing a coronavirus vaccine widely expected to be approved by U.K. authorities this week, said Sunday that researchers believe the shot will be effective against a new variant of the virus driving a rapid surge in infections in Britain.
AstraZeneca chief executive Pascal Soriot also told the Sunday Times that researchers developing its vaccine have figured out a winning formula making the jab as effective as rival candidates.
Some have raised concern that the AstraZeneca vaccine, which is being developed with Oxford University, may not be as good as the one made by Pfizer already being distributed in the U.K. and other countries. Partial results suggest that the AstraZeneca shot is about 70% effective for preventing illness from coronavirus infection, compared to the 95% efficacy reported by Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech.
We think we have figured out the winning formula and how to get efficacy that, after two doses, is up there with everybody else, Soriot said. I cant tell you more because we will publish at some point.
Britains government says its medicines regulator is reviewing the final data from AstraZenecas phase three clinical trials. The Times and others have reported that the green light could come by Thursday, and the vaccines can start to be rolled out for the U.K. public in the first week of January.
Asked about the vaccines efficacy against the new variant of coronavirus spreading in the U.K., Soriot said: So far, we think the vaccine should remain effective. But we cant be sure, so were going to test that.
British authorities have blamed the new virus variant for soaring infection rates across the country. They said the variant is much more transmittable, but stress there is no evidence it makes people more ill.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson sounded an urgent alarm about the variant days before Christmas, saying the new version of the virus was spreading rapidly and that plans to travel and gather must be canceled for millions to curb the spread of the virus.
Authorities have since put increasing areas of the country affecting about 24 million people, or 43% of the population in the strictest level of restrictions. Nonessential shops have closed, restaurants and pubs can only operate for takeout and no indoor socializing is allowed.
Many countries swiftly barred travel from the U.K., but cases of the new variant have since also been reported in a dozen locations around the world.
Public health officials said on Dec. 24 that more than 600,000 people had received the first of two doses of the Pfizer vaccine.
Britain recorded another 30,501 positive COVID-19 cases and a further 316 deaths on Sunday, bringing the countrys total death toll to 70,752. Many hospitals are under pressure, including the largest hospital in Wales, which issued an urgent appeal on Saturday for health care staff or medical students to help care for coronavirus patients in intensive care.
The health board that runs University Hospital of Wales said Sunday that the situation has improved, but its critical care unit remains extremely busy.
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SEATTLE Federal approval of the second coronavirus vaccine means more doses are coming to Washington and with them a growing interest about the distribution of vaccines.
This week, Washington was set to receive 130,000 doses of Modernas vaccine, which was approved by the Western States Scientific Safety Review Workgroup on Sunday after having been awarded emergency approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Friday.
Some of the first Moderna doses were delivered to the Seattle Indian Health Board Monday, where members of the executive team were vaccinated to demonstrate its safety and effectiveness.
Getting the vaccine to every corner of the state and getting it into the arms of everyone who wants it is a logistical and messaging challenge for public health officials.
In this weeks FAQ, we answer questions about how people will know when it is their turn to be vaccinated and whether pregnant women should be vaccinated for the virus.
Q. How will people know when they can get the vaccine?
A. Vaccinating the population against coronavirus is a herculean task that requires state and public health officials to prioritize vaccinations and decide who to inoculate as more vaccine becomes available.
Currently, only high-risk health care workers and residents and employees at long-term care facilities are being vaccinated. The state Department of Health (DOH) is working to finalize its vaccine allocation and list of where state residents fall on the prioritization list.
This framework is informed by national guidelines and guided by feedback from the communities, partners, sectors and industries that are heavily impacted by covid-19 in Washington state, Franji Mayes, a DOH spokesperson, wrote in an email.
The prioritization list will be posted on DOHs website when it is finished, Mayes said.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has developed a tool for smartphones to remind people when they are due for their second dose of the coronavirus vaccine. A web address to get started with the program is provided in the vaccine information sheet given to those receiving their first doses.
Q. Do people have a choice between the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines?
A. There are a number of coronavirus vaccines being developed. Modernas vaccine received emergency regulatory approval last week, making two vaccines available.
Because there are only two vaccines available, most facilities with vaccines are following the CDC and DOH guidelines to vaccinate what is being called the 1a group. This initial group includes residents and employees at long-term care facilities and health care workers who are at high risk of contracting the virus.
These restrictions limiting choice could last for weeks or months, but that could change as supplies increase, according to Public Health Seattle & King County.
Q. Should women who are trying to become pregnant, or are pregnant or breastfeeding, be vaccinated?
A. While there arent studies about pregnancy and the coronavirus vaccine because none of the clinical trials included pregnant women, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) recommends that pregnant and lactating women who want the vaccine have the option of receiving it.
The ACOG recommends pregnant women discuss the vaccine with their health care providers. Those who become pregnant in between doses she should still get the second dose.
Other things to consider, according to the ACOG:
There currently is no preference between the Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines, other than that the latter is available to 16- and 17-year-olds.
Pregnant women who get one of the coronavirus vaccines should delay getting other vaccinations, like for the flu or Tdap, for 14 days after the second coronavirus shot.
Categories:Coronavirus | Health | News | Top Stories | U.S./World
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Life wasnt always like this for Libby Pederson.
She used to know how to dress herself in the morning without notes. Cooking dinner did not confound her.
That changed in November, when the 44-year-old got sick with the coronavirus and developed mysterious neurological symptoms that landed her in the hospital. Ever since, Pederson has been struggling to heal from what doctors say can be a little-known, little-understood consequence of the virus: persistent and debilitating brain and cognitive problems.
On the worst days, the days when she sits on her couch or stays in bed, Pederson wonders if shell return to being the busy and capable single mom and special education teacher at an Anchorage elementary school she was just two months ago.
I feel like Ive lost who I am, she said.
The way coronavirus wreaks havoc on some patients respiratory systems has been well documented. But scientists are just beginning to understand how the coronavirus can affect the brain.
Researchers around the world have been compiling documentation of COVID-19 patients with neurological symptoms ranging from psychosis to memory loss, according to an article published in the journal Nature in September. The people experiencing neurological damage often arent otherwise very sick. And they arent always older, either.
Libby Pederson at her home in Anchorage on Wednesday, Dec. 23, 2020. In November, a coronavirus infection left her hospitalized with a rare brain inflammation caused by the virus. Before the infection, she was very active. Now, some days she is unable to leave the couch. (Emily Mesner / ADN)
Weve seen this group of younger people without conventional risk factors who are having strokes, and patients having acute changes in mental status that are not otherwise explained, a UK neurologist said in the Nature article.
It isnt clear whether coronavirus actually has the ability to enter the brain, or whether a haywire immune response to the virus causes inflammation, according to Nature. Its also not known exactly how many people in Alaska have experienced neurological symptoms like Pederson.
Complications of COVID-19 infection are not reportable to the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services, so we do not know how many neurological complications have occurred in Alaska, said Joseph McLaughlin, chief of the Alaska Section of Epidemiology.
I was just wanting to die
Pedersons coronavirus experience began unremarkably: On Nov. 13, her daughter held up a scented candle for her to sniff and she smelled nothing. The next day her ability to taste vanished. Pederson hurried to get a COVID-19 test.
By the time she got the positive results back, her head was throbbing with a level of pain shed never experienced before, even as a longtime migraine sufferer. Headaches are among less common but still recognized symptoms of the coronavirus.
Pederson says she spent days curled up in the fetal position in her darkened bedroom. Her 20-year-old daughter took care of things around the house, she thinks.
It was just wanting to die in my room, she said. I really honestly dont know what happened that week in the house.
On Nov. 18, the pain drove her to the emergency room. The acute pain dissipated with time, but her thinking and speech remained murky -- like driving in the dark without headlights.
Libby Pederson, right, works with her occupational therapist, Nori Dixon, on memory and attention to detail during an appointment at Providence Rehabilitation Services on Tuesday, Dec. 22, 2020. If I didn't have this tight group I wouldn't know what I'd do, Pederson said of her speech, occupational and physical therapists. (Emily Mesner / ADN)
By early December, things just werent making sense, she said. She would turn on gas burners and wander away. She began to stutter. Her children found her dressed in snow gear, standing in the pantry. She couldnt explain what she was doing there.
When Pederson called her primary doctor for help on Dec. 2, her speech was so broken by stuttering she was told to hang up and head to the emergency room, she said.
Thats where she encountered Dr. Ben Westley, an Anchorage infectious disease specialist.
Westley said he was initially concerned that Pederson, because of her neurological symptoms, had viral encephalitis -- a very serious but straightforward diagnosis. Tests revealed she did not. A sensitive MRI of Pedersons brain did find inflammation, said Westley, who was authorized by Pederson to discuss her medical treatment.
The symptoms she continues to experience -- persistent, debilitating trouble with concentration, memory, attention, speech and fatigue -- fall into a category of COVID-19 damage thats poorly understood.
It seems pretty clear to me now that she has some form of other lingering symptoms related to COVID-19 that we really dont understand very well, he said.
What Pederson is experiencing is distressing, but hes confident that she will continue to recover, Westley said.
The whole thing is scary, he said. When you get it and you feel terrible and you just dont feel better -- thats stressful, hard thing for anybody.
Five weeks after her COVID-19 diagnosis, Pedersons days are filled with therapy appointments: occupational, physical and speech.
Libby Pederson works with her physical therapist during an appointment at Providence Rehabilitation Services in Anchorage on Tuesday, Dec. 22, 2020. (Emily Mesner / ADN)
At a recent physical therapy appointment, she practiced walking on a treadmill, working on her balance. At occupational therapy, she studied a sample electric bill, trying to answer questions like What is the total amount of your bills?
As an elementary school special education teacher, she finds herself applying techniques she uses with her young students, such as teaching them to break complex tasks down into smaller, more manageable chunks.
She leaves herself notes about the steps she needs to take to get dressed. Making dinner requires a detailed plan.
I have to constantly think through the whole meal: Turn the burner off. Wash the dishes. Things that were common sense before, she said.
Libby Pederson reads a monitor showing her blood pressure as she slowly walks on a treadmill during her physical therapy appointment at Providence Rehabilitation Services on Tuesday. If I didn't have this tight group I wouldn't know what I'd do, Pederson said of her speech, occupational and physical therapists. (Emily Mesner / ADN)
Theres no real long-term prognosis because what happened to her is so rare. Working with young special education students and their families has helped her both to see the work ahead, but also to have hope.
Some people think shes on vacation, or dont believe shes sick because she physically looks OK. COVID-19 affects every person differently, she said, and its just luck of the draw, how it affected me so bad.
Im not enjoying this. Im not having fun, she said. I feel like Ive gone to hell and Im trying to dig my way out.
ADN photojournalist Emily Mesner contributed reporting to this story.
Reports of a new and more contagious coronavirus strain have prompted panic in Europe and beyond.
The new variant of the virus, whichmight be up to 70% more transmissible, was first detected in the UK in September but had since spread rapidly.
The new variant has brought some countries to close their borders and tighten their travel restrictions even further.
From Japan to Sweden, scroll down to see a list of countries where the new coronavirus strain has already been identified.
