Vaccines and Therapeutics 2.0 & 3.0 Merge

[Jersey Girl]

Here's a link to the 198-page plan to fight Covid.

https://www.whitehouse.gov/priorities/covid-19/

[Jersey Girl]

Dr. Anthony Fauci returns to White House press briefing to give update on COVID-19 response
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rH9s3z4Ong

[Jersey Girl]

We need better face masks—and origami might help
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/scie ... 4E3A4DE500

[MsJack]

I am booked for the first dose of the Moderna vaccine on Monday.

Can't wait.

[Bret Ripley]

My wife is scheduled for her first jab this afternoon. I'll report back if she starts growing horns or turning into a lizard. Don't worry if I don't report back: I'm fairly adept at handling life's little disappointments.

[Jersey Girl]

Jack and Bret,

Please report back on reactions to the first dose of vaccine and then, the second when the time comes. I would like to hear the details even if the reactions are few and seemingly insignificant. For example, if there is fever how did you treat it and how long did it last?

Best wishes to you for a successful poke Jack and Ms. Bret!

[Bret Ripley]

Jack and Bret,

Please report back on reactions to the first dose of vaccine ...

Happy to oblige. Not a lot to report so far, but for what it may be worth ...

About 22 hours ago the missus and I went to a local hospital where she received her first dose of the Moderna juice, the same type Jack is scheduled to receive tomorrow. She reported no initial reaction to the shot; didn't feel a thing, in fact. My wife works in healthcare (she's a Physical Therapist) and is employed by the same company as the hospital's staff, and during the 15-minute post-injection monitoring period she talked shop with the nurse and was told that there had been no cases of post-injection drama (anaphylaxis) at the facility.

Later in the afternoon the injection site (upper arm) became increasingly tender, and by bed time she described the soreness as being similar to the sensation she experiences after a tetanus shot, except that with tetanus the soreness begins shortly after injection. Her arm is still sore this morning, and she mentioned it caused her some discomfort during the night. Today she's feeling some body aches; not new aches, mind you, but her 'normal' aches are "2 points higher" (on a 10-point scale). There have been no signs of fever so far (fingers crossed).

And that's it so far; we'll take things easy today and see how she feels as the day progresses.

One thing that came as a pleasant surprise: she was very impressed with the system the hospital has in place to process injection recipients. It was very orderly and efficient; she brought reading material and a crossword puzzle but these were unnecessary precautions. Heck, due to limitations on patient visits even parking at the hospital was a breeze.

The nurse she chatted with mentioned that the hospital is administering an average of 20 COVID vaccinations every 15 minutes. I don't know if that's good or bad, but one restricting factor is simply that of available hospital space: the post-injection observation area was full and a meeting room normally used by the Board of Directors was opened to handle the overflow.

[MsJack]

Thanks for the report, Bret. I'm up tomorrow at 9 am CST. I hope things are as orderly here!

[canpakes]

Today she's feeling some body aches; not new aches, mind you, but her 'normal' aches are "2 points higher" (on a 10-point scale).

Keeping my fingers crossed that neither of you exceed level ‘3’ on the chart below ...

[canpakes]

Merck has decided to discontinue their COVID vaccine effort:

Merck & Co. is discontinuing development of its two experimental Covid-19 vaccines after early trial data showed they failed to generate immune responses comparable to a natural infection or existing vaccines.

The U.S. drug giant, which has a long history of successfully developing vaccines, had adopted a different strategy from rivals Pfizer Inc., Moderna Inc. and Johnson & Johnson, using a more traditional approach of focusing on shots based on weakened viruses. One, called V590, borrowed technology from Merck’s Ebola inoculation, while the other, V591, is based on a measles vaccine used in Europe.

Both V590 and V591 were laggards in the vaccine-development race. Merck finished recruiting the first participants for early-stage safety studies near the end of 2020, when front-runners Pfizer and Moderna were preparing to report late-stage data on their shots’ effectiveness. Merck received interim results from its trials this month.

The results were “disappointing, and a bit of a surprise,” said Nick Kartsonis, senior vice president of clinical research for infectious diseases and vaccines at Merck Research Laboratories. Both shots generated fewer neutralizing antibodies to halt infection than other Covid-19 vaccines, and produced inferior immune responses compared with people who had naturally contracted the coronavirus.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... nd=premium