CV-19 fears – part III
- 01/18/2022 – be alert on the new covid variant
WHO says omicron won’t be last Covid variant as global cases surge by 20% in a week
- Dr. Bruce Aylward, a senior WHO official, warned high levels of transmission give the virus more opportunity to replicate and mutate, raising the risk that another variant will emerge.
- New infections have increased by 20% globally over the past week with nearly 19 million total reported cases.
- “This pandemic is nowhere near over,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreysus said.
White House chief medical advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci on Monday said it is too early to predict whether omicron will mark the final wave of the pandemic.
“I would hope that that’s the case, but that would only be the case if we don’t get another variant that eludes the immune response of the prior variant,” Fauci told the World Economic Forum’s Davos Agenda via video conference.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreysus said new infections are peaking in some countries, providing hope that the worst of the omicron wave is over. However, Tedros said no country is out of the woods yet, warning that health-care systems are still under pressure from the unprecedented wave of infections.
“I urge everyone to do their best to reduce risk of infection so that you can help take pressure off the system,” Tedros said. “Now is not the time to give up and wave the white flag.”
The WHO has repeatedly warned that unequal distribution of vaccines worldwide has led to low immunization rates in developing countries, leaving vast populations vulnerable to the emergence of new variants. The WHO had set a target for every country to vaccinate 40% of its population by the end of 2021. However, 92 countries have not achieved that goal, according to the WHO.
“This pandemic is nowhere near over and with the incredible growth of omicron globally, new variants are likely to emerge, which is why tracking and assessment remain critical,” Tedros said.
- 01/18/2022 – more good news
Pfizer’s New Covid-19 Pill Works Against Omicron in Lab – WSJ
Three separate, unpublished lab studies indicate Paxlovid is effective against the variant despite its mutations
Herd Immunity Is Over—Long Live Superimmunity – WSJ
The Omicron wave will leave most people with potent and durable protection against Covid.
All of this suggests that infection with Omicron is likely to stimulate potent and durable protection against Covid-19—and potentially other coronaviruses—even if it mutates to become more virulent. As Omicron rapidly spreads, people who have been vaccinated or previously infected will develop superimmunity. Covid-19 will become a virus that causes cold- and sometimes flulike symptoms—annoying but rarely deadly or disruptive.
One caveat is that older people generate weaker T-cell responses and memories to infections and vaccines. They’re likely to need annual booster shots. Omicron will end the pandemic by making Covid-19 endemic.
- 01/03/2022 – good news on Omicron variant
South Africa Says Its Omicron Wave Is in Retreat – WSJ New U.K. data bolsters evidence that the variant is less likely to cause severe disease than earlier versions of the virus
Dr. Scott Gottlieb predicts Omicron wave could subside by end of February
Former FDA chief Gottlieb: It’s likely nearly half the US will have had Covid-19 by the end of 2020
FDA expands Pfizer booster eligibility to kids ages 12 to 15, authorizes third shots at 5 months
News summary from Tilson
Here’s a summary of the first, which you can read in its entirely here:
- Good news all around
- Update on my family and me
- Data from South Africa, Denmark, London, NYC (vaxxed vs. unvaxxed), U.S.
- Joe Golton, Dr. Maki, Dr. Wachter and my takes
- U.S. and EU deaths may not rise
- Omicron is replacing delta
- CDC reduces isolation period
- Doctor Submits Fluvoxamine EUA Application to FDA
- Unvaccinated High School Sweethearts Alvaro and Sylvia Fernandez Die of COVID on Same Day
- Studies Suggest Why Omicron Is Less Severe: It Spares the Lungs
- People with Omicron are less likely to need hospitalization, U.K. report finds
And here’s a summary of the second one, which you can read here:
- U.K. study on vaccine effectiveness
- Many should get booster sooner
- Dr. Maki answers questions
- Omicron is spreading at lightning speed
- NYC and London data
- Omicron is displacing delta
- Upgrade your mask
- Twitter bans Dr. Robert Malone
- Three questions & answers
- 01/03/2022 – from Tilson – omicron variant will prove to be the end of the pandemic. the huge omicron-driven surge of cases that’s already happening in the Northeast, Puerto Rico, Ohio, Illinois, Hawaii, Wisconsin, and Florida is going to spread across the U.S. in the next few weeks – breaking all prior records – which is going to freak everyone out. But then cases will peak, likely in mid-January, and hospitalizations will remain under control, thus transforming the pandemic to an endemic.
I think the omicron variant will prove to be the end of the pandemic, as I wrote in last Wednesday’s daily: I have increasing confidence that the pandemic will soon be over:
Based on eight more days of data since my December 14 e-mail entitled, Will the pandemic soon be over?, I have a higher degree of confidence (perhaps 70%, up from 50%) that my theory is correct that “the omicron variant, rather than being a global nightmare, may actually soon lead to the end of the pandemic, [as it] morphs into something akin to the seasonal flu in the next month or two.”
That said, the huge omicron-driven surge of cases that’s already happening in the Northeast, Puerto Rico, Ohio, Illinois, Hawaii, Wisconsin, and Florida is going to spread across the U.S. in the next few weeks – breaking all prior records – which is going to freak everyone out. But then cases will peak, likely in mid-January, and hospitalizations will remain under control, thus transforming the pandemic to an endemic.
- 12/26/2021 – Pfizer Covid pills may be risky with other medications. But the risk is low and can be manageable. Just be aware of the risk of this medication
The Food and Drug Administration authorized Pfizer’s Paxlovid for mild to moderate Covid in people as young as 12 who have underlying conditions that raise the risk of hospitalization and death from the coronavirus, such as heart disease or diabetes. However, one of the two drugs in the antiviral cocktail could cause severe or life-threatening interactions with widely used medications, including statins, blood thinners and some antidepressants. And the FDA does not recommend Paxlovid for people with severe kidney or liver disease.
Because the Paxlovid treatment is brief — 30 pills, taken as three pills twice a day for five days — experts are hopeful that the risk of adverse interactions with other medications is low.
“Five days of interactions is not a big deal for the majority of drugs,” said Jason Gallagher, a clinical pharmacy specialist in infectious diseases at Temple University Hospital in Philadelphia.
If a drug’s potential interaction with Paxlovid poses too much of a risk, Anderson said, a safe and effective alternative Covid-19 therapy would be GlaxoSmithKline’s sotrovimab — the sole authorized monoclonal antibody treatment that research indicates reliably neutralizes the omicron variant of the virus. Otherwise, the antiviral molnupiravir is an option, albeit one with a much lower efficacy than either Paxlovid or sotrovimab.
Even with the concerns about taking Paxlovid with other prescription medications, experts are excited about the drug’s potential.
“Paxlovid is a breakthrough drug,” Anderson said. “This could make a real difference in the pandemic by making an effective Covid treatment available to many people.”
- 12/26/2021 – I think Tilson could be right, there’s increasing evidence that the omicron variant is milder than delta
Following up on yesterday’s e-mail…
1) I’m pleased to have scooped the mainstream media, which is just starting to report on what I’ve been saying for nine days: there’s increasing evidence that the omicron variant is milder than delta (though we still can’t say this with certainty, as I discuss in #2 below).
2) While these news studies provide further evidence that omicron is milder than delta, they’re not definitive because there are many other moving pieces, two of which I’ve discussed previously: higher vaccination rates and more people who’ve recovered from COVID, both of which would of course lead to lower severity numbers.
And here’s another variable I hadn’t considered: because omicron is so much more transmissible, even among those who are fully vaccinated and/or had prior infection, a far higher percentage of those infected fall into those two categories, as these two charts in the FT article, from the Danish study, show:
