Written by Steven Hansen
The U.S. new cases 7-day rolling average are 13.4 % LOWER than the 7-day rolling average one week ago and U.S. deaths due to coronavirus are now 20.4 % LOWER than the rolling average one week ago. Today’s posts include:
- U.S. Coronavirus New Cases are 12,753
- U.S. Coronavirus deaths are at 369
- Biden administration investing billions in antiviral pills for COVID-19
- Why so many Covid-19 variants are showing up now
- Antibody Cocktail Cut Death Rate in Certain Severe COVID Patients
- Plexiglass Screens Installed To Stop COVID May Have Actually Increased Its Spread, UK Govt Report Finds
- CDC lowers travel warning for cruise ships and still recommends avoiding them if not fully vaccinated
- If You Get COVID 19: Optimize Immune System
- NAC Banned on Amazon, Threatened by FDA
- SCOTUS Dismisses Threat to Obamacare Once More
- Why are Olympics going on despite public, medical warnings?
- Appeals court refuses to reinstate N Carolina abortion ban
- Plus a lot more headlines …
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Hospitalizations Are The Only Accurate Gauge
Hospitalizations historically appear to be little affected by weekends or holidays. The hospitalization growth rate trend continues to improve.
source: https://gis.cdc.gov/grasp/covidnet/COVID19_3.html
Historically, hospitalization growth follows new case growth by one to two weeks.
As an analyst, I use the rate of growth to determine the trend. But, the size of the pandemic is growing in terms of real numbers – and if the rate of growth does not become negative – the pandemic will overwhelm all resources.
The graph below shows the rate of growth relative to the growth a week earlier updated through today [note that negative numbers mean the rolling averages are LOWER than the rolling averages one week ago]. As one can see, the rate of growth for new cases peaked in early December 2020 for Thanksgiving, and early January 2021 for end-of-year holidays – and it now shows that the coronavirus effect is improving.
In the scheme of things, new cases decline first, followed by hospitalizations, and then deaths. The potential fourth wave did not materialize likely due to immunizations.
Coronavirus and Recovery News You May Have Missed
A long-term perspective on immunity to COVID – Nature
Determining the duration of protective immunity to infection by SARS-CoV-2 is crucial for understanding and predicting the course of the COVID-19 pandemic. Clinical studies now indicate that immunity will be long-lasting.
When Turner et al. tracked the concentrations of antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 in the individuals’ blood serum for up to one year, they observed a biphasic pattern (Fig. 1). In the acute immune response around the time of initial infection, antibody concentrations were high. They subsequently declined, as expected, because most of the plasma cells of an acute immune response are short-lived. After a few months, the antibody concentrations levelled off and remained more or less constant at roughly 10-20% of the maximum concentration observed. This is consistent with the expectation that 10-20% of the plasma cells in an acute immune reaction become memory plasma cells5, and is a clear indication of a shift from antibody production by short-lived plasma cells to antibody production by memory plasma cells. This is not unexpected, given that immune memory to many viruses and vaccines is stable over decades, if not for a lifetime8.
Figure 1 | The immune response to SARS-CoV-2 infection. Data are becoming available that shed light on longer-term aspects of the human immune response to coronavirus infection. One component of the defence response is the production of antibodies that target viral proteins (red line). During the initial, acute phase of the immune response, antibody levels peak rapidly; this peak is generated by short-lived immune cells called plasma cells. Turner et al.1 present clinical evidence, from people who have had COVID-19, that long-lived, memory plasma cells that produce antibodies are generated in the bone marrow. These cells provide long-term antibody production that offers stable protection at a level of 10-20% of that during the acute phase (blue line). Memory plasma cells are a cell type that can be maintained for many years, if not a lifetime8. Wang et al.2 have characterized antibody responses at between six months and a year in people who have been infected with SARS-CoV-2; their results also provide evidence for the generation of immunological memory.
Why are Olympics going on despite public, medical warnings? – AP
Public sentiment in Japan has been generally opposed to holding the Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics, partly based on fears the coronavirus will spike as almost 100,000 people — athletes and others — enter for both events.
The Japanese medical community is largely against it. The government’s main medical adviser Dr. Shigeru Omi has said it’s “abnormal” to hold the Olympics during a pandemic. So far, only 5% of Japanese are fully vaccinated.
The medical journal The Lancet has raised questions about the health risks and criticized the World Health Organization and other health bodies for not taking a clear stand. The New England Journal of Medicine has said the IOC’s decision to proceed “is not informed by the best scientific evidence.”
The second-largest selling newspaper in Japan, the Asahi Shimbun, has called for the Olympics to be canceled. So have other regional newspapers.
Still, they are going ahead. How have the International Olympic Committee and the Japanese government of Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga been able to bypass strong opposition?
At the core is the Host City Contract that gives the IOC the sole authority to cancel. If Japan cancels, it would have to compensate the IOC. Of course, the IOC is unlikely to sue a host city. So any deal would be worked out behind the scenes.
And there are billions at stake. Japan has officially spent $15.4 billion but government audits suggest it’s twice that much. Japanese advertising giant Dentsu Inc., a key player in landing the corruption-tainted bid in 2013, has raised more than $3 billion from local sponsors.
Why so many Covid-19 variants are showing up now – YouTube
SCOTUS Dismisses Threat to Obamacare Once More – MedPage
The U.S. Supreme Court batted down a lawsuit led by several Republican states and the former Trump administration that challenged the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), upholding the law for a third time.
In a vote of 7-2 on Thursday, the justices ruled that challengers lacked legal standing to bring forward the case. The decision to toss the suit preserves the landmark healthcare law and access to health plans for millions of Americans.
The case centered around the constitutionality of keeping the ACA in place after the penalty for the individual mandate — a requirement that Americans enroll in a health insurance plan — had been zeroed out.
But justices appeared sympathetic to keeping the law intact during oral arguments last November, and on Thursday, they argued that the plaintiffs had not been injured by the provision in question.
“Plaintiffs in this suit failed to show a concrete, particularized injury fairly traceable to the defendants’ conduct in enforcing the specific statutory provision they attack as unconstitutional,” concluded Justice Stephen Breyer, who penned the majority’s decision. “They have failed to show that they have standing to attack as unconstitutional the Act’s minimum essential coverage provision.”
Therefore the case was dismissed.
Plexiglass Screens Installed To Stop COVID May Have Actually Increased Its Spread, UK Govt Report Finds – ZeroHedge
A leaked Whitehall document seen by Politico suggests that perspex screens installed to stop the transmission of COVID-19 may actually have increased its spread.
Businesses and schools were told by the government to install the screens as a condition of re-opening after the first lockdown and they were widely used by ‘essential’ shops throughout the entire period.
Politico’s Alex Wickham writes that the perspex screens could be about to be scrapped given new information the government has received on their efficacy.
“Ministers are also being advised that those perspex screens that have appeared in some offices and restaurants are unlikely to have any benefit in terms of preventing transmission,” states the report.
“Problems include them not being positioned correctly, with the possibility that they actually increase the risk of transmission by blocking airflow. Therefore there is clear guidance to ministers that these perspex screens should be scrapped.”
Despite the report, government ministers say there is no plan to change advice on installing the screens in businesses.
What other COVID-19 measures put in place to fight the spread of the virus have been utterly useless or actually made it worse?
Record profits warranted record bonuses. That was the recommendation in January by executives at the biotech firm Emergent BioSolutions. The board of directors agreed, signing off on nearly $8 million in cash and stock awards for five company leaders.
The bonuses arrived this spring even as Congress was investigating the company’s production of Covid-19 vaccines in Baltimore, where manufacturing mistakes have rendered 75 million doses unusable and forced a two-month-long shutdown of operations.
Emergent has nonetheless enjoyed the best financial year in its two-decade history, thanks largely to the government’s largess and decision to sidestep the usual contracting rules, interviews and previously undisclosed documents show.
Without seeking competitive bids, federal officials in May 2020 not only committed to reserve production space at the troubled Baltimore plant, but also booked two Emergent facilities nearby to bottle and package vaccines and coronavirus drugs. Regulators have criticized those sites for quality shortcomings in recent years, according to previously unreported inspections, including one just this April when health investigators found that a factory was not taking adequate steps to prevent contamination.
… Emergent was in a good position to benefit. A longtime federal contractor based in Gaithersburg, Md., the company had effectively cornered the market for federal biodefense contracts, building a successful business over the past two decades atop its sales of anthrax vaccines to the nation’s emergency medical stockpile, The New York Times reported in March.
Even though it had never won regulatory approval to mass-produce anything at its main Baltimore plant, the politically connected company was tasked with making two Covid-19 vaccines there.
Appeals court refuses to reinstate N Carolina abortion ban – AP
North Carolina’s ban on most abortions after the 20th week of pregnancy must remain unenforceable, a federal appeals court ruled on Wednesday, rejecting arguments that the law should be left intact because prosecutors aren’t going after doctors who violate it.
A three-judge panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Virginia, upheld a 2019 lower-court decision striking down the prohibition, which has been on the books since 1973.
The Republican-dominated legislature in 2015 narrowed the scope of medical emergencies under which a woman would be exempt from the 20-week limit.
That meant more abortions involving unviable fetuses could be considered criminal, raising the fear for abortion providers that they could face prosecution. A U.S. District Court judge in 2019 agreed and blocked the law’s enforcement in situations where the fetus would be considered not viable.
Antibody Cocktail Cut Death Rate in Certain Severe COVID Patients – MedPage
The monoclonal antibody cocktail casirivimab and imdevimab reduced the risk of death by one-fifth in hospitalized patients with severe COVID-19 who had not mounted an adequate antibody response, data from the U.K.’s RECOVERY trial showed.
The 28-day mortality rate was significantly lower among patients who were seronegative at baseline and received the antibody combination compared with those receiving usual care alone (24% vs 30%, respectively; RR 0.80, 95% CI 0.70-0.91), according to a press release from the investigators.
If patients were seronegative, it meant they had not mounted an adequate antibody response, they added.
They also noted that for every 100 patients treated, there would be six fewer deaths.
Additionally, duration of hospital stay was shorter in seronegative patients randomized to the antibody cocktail versus usual care (4 vs 17 days, respectively), and more seronegative patients were discharged alive by day 28 (64% vs 58%). However, the authors emphasized that this effect was not seen in seropositive patients, nor those who did mount an antibody response, at baseline. When the two groups were combined, the effect on 28-day mortality was no longer significant (RR 0.96, 95% CI 0.86-1.03).
Interestingly, NIH’s COVID-19 guidelines panel recommends against the use of this therapy in hospitalized patients, except in a clinical trial. The FDA authorized casirivimab and imdevimab for patients with mild to moderate COVID-19 under emergency use authorization (EUA).
NAC Banned on Amazon, Threatened by FDA – Mercola
- The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is suddenly cracking down on N-acetylcysteine (NAC), claiming it is excluded from the definition of a dietary supplement. As a result, Amazon has removed all listings featuring NAC-containing supplements
- The trade group for the supplement industry, the Council for Responsible Nutrition, is challenging the FDA’s position, calling it “legally invalid,” and is urging its members to continue selling NAC supplements
- NAC supplements have been sold for 57 years, and the FDA has never taken action against it — until now, when 16 clinical trials are investigating its usefulness against COVID-19
- NAC is a precursor to reduced glutathione, which appears to play a crucial role in COVID-19. There’s evidence glutathione deficiency may worsen COVID-19 severity
- NAC inhibits expression of proinflammatory cytokines that can trigger a cytokine storm, improves T cell response, benefits a variety of lung problems, and inhibits the hypercoagulation that can result in stroke and/or blood clots that impair the ability to exchange oxygen in the lungs
If You Get COVID 19: Optimize Immune System (Vitamin D, Monoclonal Antibodies, NAC, Quercetin etc.) – YouTube
Biden administration investing billions in antiviral pills for COVID-19 – The Hill
The Biden administration plans to invest billions of dollars in antiviral pills to treat COVID-19 and ready the U.S. to combat future viruses that have the potential to spark a pandemic, the government announced on Thursday.
Officials committed to spending more than $3 billion on the Antiviral Program for Pandemics that aims to support and speed up the development and production of antiviral treatments for COVID-19 to reduce serious illnesses and deaths. The hope is for some treatments to be available by the end of 2021.
The goal of the program is to produce an oral drug that Americans can take early in their COVID-19 infection to prevent hospitalizations and fatalities from the disease. Such an oral pill would operate similarly to antiviral treatments for influenza, HIV and hepatitis C.
“Having additional FDA-authorized antiviral medicines available within a year would be a major breakthrough in ongoing efforts to combat COVID-19 and protect the public,” a press release from the Department Health and Human Services said.
Nineteen therapeutic agents will be prioritized for testing in clinical trials to treat COVID-19 patients.
The Antiviral Program for Pandemics also aims to create platforms for the innovation of other antiviral drugs to allow the U.S. to respond quicker to future viruses that could spread to pandemic levels.
The funding for the program comes from the American Rescue Plan, which President Biden signed in March.
[editor’s note: also read COVID Pill Treatment Could be Available by End of Year]
New York City plans to move about 8,000 homeless people from hotels back into shelters by the end of July. – New York Times
The pandemic has put a spotlight on parosmia, a once little-known condition that distorts the senses of smell and taste, spurring research and a host of articles in medical journals.
Membership has swelled in existing support groups, and new ones have sprouted. A fast-growing British-based parosmia group on Facebook has more than 14,000 members. And parosmia-related ventures, including podcasts and smell training kits, are gaining followers.
A key question remains: How long does Covid-19-linked parosmia last? Scientists have no firm answers.
Parosmia is one of several Covid-related problems associated with smell and taste. The partial or complete loss of smell, or anosmia, is often the first symptom of the coronavirus. The loss of taste, or ageusia, can also be a symptom.
In 2020, parosmia became remarkably widespread, frequently affecting Covid-19 patients, who lost their sense of smell and then largely regained it, before a distorted sense of smell and taste began.
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Tuesday lowered the level of its travel health notice for cruise ships from “Level 4: Very High” to “Level 3: High.”
On its website, the CDC says this travel notice is specifically for travelers who are not fully vaccinated and that it recommends that travelers who aren’t fully vaccinated avoid travel on all cruise ships.
They note that since the coronavirus spreads easier between people who are in close quarters aboard ships, the chance of getting it on one is high.
“It is especially important that people who are not fully vaccinated with an increased risk of severe illness avoid travel on cruise ships, including river cruises,” says the CDC.It also advises that people who decide to go on a cruise should get tested one to three days before their trip and three to five days after. People who are not fully vaccinated should also self-quarantine for seven days after travel, even if they test negative. Those who do not get tested should self-quarantine for 10 days after travel.
Linsey Marr, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at Virginia Tech, says that the CDC easing this travel warning reflects the country’s current situation.
“I think they can do that because enough people have been vaccinated and cases are low enough right now that that lowers the overall risk,” she told CNN.
The following are foreign headlines with hyperlinks to the posts
Australia is limiting AstraZeneca’s vaccine to people over 60.
A Covid vaccine developed by the German company CureVac performed poorly in a clinical trial.
With five weeks to go until the Olympics, Japan said it would ease its state of emergency.
Three Chinese astronauts docked in space to help build a rival to the International Space Station.
India’s economy likely contracted 12% in Q1: Report
Gay and bisexual men can now donate blood in the U.K.; the practice is still restricted in the U.S.
Moscow Makes COVID-19 Vaccination Compulsory for Public-Facing Workers
England to Make COVID-19 Vaccinations Compulsory for Care Workers
EU Approval of Russia’s Sputnik V Vaccine Delayed, Sources Say
Despite the G7 pledge of global aid, South Asian countries still scramble for vaccines.
The Taj Mahal reopens for visitors as India eases some restrictions.
The following additional national and state headlines with hyperlinks to the posts
Americans Are Increasingly “Fleeing” California And New York For Florida And Texas: Study
Juneteenth Will Be a New Holiday for Feds, Although It’s Unclear When. The holiday would typically be observed Friday, but a lack of lead time to implement a newly passed bill could delay when federal workers see a new day off.
An extended and potentially lethal heat wave is threatening more than 40 million Americans in western parts of the country.
Myocarditis-like symptoms in seven Virginia patients following COVID vaccination resolved after treatment with nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, colchicine, or prednisone
The U.S. government purchased another 200 million doses of Moderna’s COVID vaccine, the company announced.
Latest CDC data show that 61.7% of the eligible U.S. population (age 12 and up) have been vaccinated against COVID-19, with 51.6% now fully vaccinated.
During the pandemic, the World Health Organization broke its own rules on hiring high-priced consultants, to the tune $11.7 million, all the while struggling to pay for vaccines and other life-saving equipment.
New survey data from the American COVID-19 Vaccine Poll offer a look inside people’s varied reasons for hesitancy.
The FDA warned against breathing in hand sanitizer vapors, recommending application in well-ventilated areas.
GOP Voters Suspect Critical Race Theory Will Make U.S. Race Relations Worse
SEC delays approval of bitcoin ETF yet again
Facebook is testing AI to get you to stop fighting in its groups
Not all experts are ready to vaccinate kids against Covid
Full vaccination prevents emergency care and hospitalization in cases of breakthrough COVID-19
Long-term exposure to poor air quality increases COVID-19 risk, research finds
Covid outbreak forces lockdown at U.S. Embassy in Kabul as cases surge in Afghanistan
President Biden’s Fourth of July Covid vaccination goals are in jeopardy
Ohio will end its Covid-19 emergency declaration tomorrow
Delta variant is like “Covid on steroids,” says former White House coronavirus adviser
Fauci on the Delta variant: “I’m not concerned about the people who are vaccinated”
Today’s Posts On Econintersect Showing Impact Of The Pandemic and Recovery With Hyperlinks
May 2021 Leading Economic Index Increased Again
12 June 2021 New York Fed Weekly Economic Index (WEI): Index Has Tiny Gain
June 2021 Philly Fed Manufacturing Survey Index Little Changed
12 June 2021 Initial Unemployment Claims Rolling Average Modestly Improves
A Broken System: The Number Of Indigenous People Who Died From Coronavirus May Never Be Known
Warning to Readers
The amount of politically biased articles on the internet continues. And studies and opinions of the experts continue to contradict other studies and expert opinions. Honestly, it is difficult to believe anything anymore.
I assemble this coronavirus update daily – sifting through the posts on the internet. I try to avoid politically slanted posts (mostly from CNN, New York Times, and the Washington Post) and can usually find unslanted posts on that subject from other sources on the internet. I wait to publish posts on subjects that I cannot validate across several sources. But after all this extra work, I do not know if I have conveyed the REAL facts. It is my job to provide information so that you have the facts necessary – and then it is up to readers to draw conclusions.
Analyst Opinion of Coronavirus Data
There are several takeaways that need to be understood when viewing coronavirus statistical data:
- The global counts are suspect for a variety of reasons including political. Even the U.S. count has issues as it is possible that as much as half the population has had coronavirus and was asymptomatic. It would be a far better metric using a random sampling of the population weekly. In short, we do not understand the size of the error in the tracking numbers.
- Just because some of the methodology used in aggregating the data in the U.S. is flawed – as long as the flaw is uniformly applied – you establish a baseline. This is why it is dangerous to compare two countries as they likely use different methodologies to determine who has (and who died) from coronavirus.
- COVID-19 and the flu are different but can have similar symptoms. COVID-19 so far is much more deadly than the flu. [click here to compare symptoms]
- From an industrial engineering point of view, one can argue that it is best to flatten the curve only to the point that the health care system is barely able to cope. This solution only works if-and-only-if one can catch this coronavirus once and develops immunity. In the case of COVID-19, herd immunity may need to be in the 80% to 85% range. WHO warns that few have developed antibodies to COVID-19 when recovering from COVID-19. Herd immunity does not look like an option as the variants are continuing to look for ways around immunity.
- Older population countries will have a significantly higher death rate as there is relatively few hospitalizations and deaths in younger age groups..
- There are at least 8 strains of the coronavirus.
What we do or do not know about the coronavirus [actually there is little scientifically proven information]. Most of our knowledge is anecdotal, from studies with limited subjects, or from studies without peer review.
- How many people have been infected as many do not show symptoms?
- Masks do work. Unfortunately, early in the pandemic, many health experts — in the U.S. and around the world — decided that the public could not be trusted to hear the truth about masks. Instead, the experts spread a misleading message, discouraging the use of masks.
- Current thinking is that we develop at least 12 months of immunity from further COVID infection.
- The Moderna and Pfizer vaccines have an effectiveness rate of about 95 percent after two doses. That is on par with the vaccines for chickenpox and measles. The 95 percent number understates the effectiveness as it counts anyone who came down with a mild case of Covid-19 as a failure.
- To what degree do people who never develop symptoms contribute to transmission? Research early in the pandemic suggested that the rate of asymptomatic infections could be as high as 81%. But a meta-analysis, which included 13 studies involving 21,708 people, calculated the rate of asymptomatic presentation to be 17%.
- The accuracy of rapid testing is questioned – and the more accurate test results are not being given in a timely manner.
- Can children widely spread coronavirus? [current thinking is that they are a minor source of the pandemic spread]
- Why have some places avoided big coronavirus outbreaks – and others hit hard?
- Air conditioning contributes to the pandemic spread.
- It appears that there is increased risk of infection and mortality for those living in larger occupancy households.
- Male patients have almost three times the odds of requiring intensive treatment unit (ITU) admission compared to females.
- Outdoor activities seem to be a lower risk than indoor activities.
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