Vaccination, Choice, Public Health Options 5

Frank Han MD 🇺🇦Pediatric/ACHD/GUCH Cardiologist @han_francis retweeted:
U Illinois Chicago Adult Congenital and Pediatric Cardiologist.

Benjamin Mazer @BenMazer | 8:16 AM · Jan 25, 2023:
Johns Hopkins U assistant professor of pathology, surgical pathologist, and writer exploring controversies in diagnostics and medical evidence.

Myocarditis is a serious condition that shouldn't be downplayed as benign. Tough to balance policy. But constant critics might also find the time to mention the 7 young boys who died of COVID last month, or the 13 who died the month before, or the 10 before that. All undercounts.

Paul Offit has a thoughtful commentary this week advocating for vaccinating children against COVID. He should know. Rotavirus killed just 20 kids per year in the US before he invented a vaccine against it. Now we rightly universally administer it.
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Paul A. Offit 2023. COVID-19 Vaccines in Young Children—Reassuring Evidence for Parents (Editorial). JAMA Pediatr. Published online January 23, 2023. doi:10.1001/jamapediatrics.2022.6251 https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapediatrics/article-abstract/2800744

In this issue of JAMA Pediatrics, Watanabe and coauthors1 evaluated the safety and efficacy of 2 doses of Pfizer’s messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccine in children aged 5 to 11 years during both the delta and omicron waves of COVID-19. In a systematic review and meta-analysis that included 17 published studies of 10 935 541 vaccinated and 2 635 251 unvaccinated children, they found that the mRNA vaccine was effective at preventing SARS-CoV-2 infection, symptomatic infection, hospitalization, and multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C). The vaccine was also safe; myocarditis occurred in only 1.8 per million vaccinees. This analysis offers 2 important advances over previous, smaller studies. First, during both the delta and omicron waves, mRNA vaccines consistently protected against serious illness, including MIS-C. Second, the risk of myocarditis was minuscule.

...Parents should be both compelled and reassured by the following facts:
(1) although the COVID-19 pandemic is ending, SARS-CoV2 virus will be circulating for years, if not decades;
(2) while some SARS-CoV-2 variants might have become less virulent,15 the virus is unlikely to evolve to avirulence;
(3) about 3 to 4 million children will be born every year who will be susceptible to this virus;
(4) the SARS-CoV-2 virus can cause severe and occasionally fatal disease in all age groups;
(5) mRNA vaccines, which have now been given to more than 10 million children between 5 and 11 years of age, have been shown to be effective at preventing severe disease; and
(6) myocarditis is an extremely rare consequence of mRNA vaccines in young children. Given the amount of information currently available to parents, the decision to vaccinate their children should be an easy one.

1 MD. Vaccine Education Center, Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia

References

Watanabe A, Kani R, Iwagami M, Takagi H, Yasuhara J, Kuno T. Assessment of efficacy and safety of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines in children aged 5 to 11 years: a systematic review and meta-analysis.  JAMA Pediatr. Published online January 23, 2023. doi:10.1001/jamapediatrics.2022.6243 https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapediatrics/fullarticle/2800743

Key Points

Question Are messenger RNA (mRNA) COVID-19 vaccines safe and effective in children aged 5 to 11 years?

Findings In this systematic review and meta-analysis including 17 studies with 10 935 541 vaccinated and 2 635 251 unvaccinated children aged 5 to 11 years, COVID-19 vaccination was associated with lower risks of SARS-CoV-2 infection, symptomatic COVID-19, hospitalization, and multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children. While vaccination, compared with placebo, was associated with higher incidences of adverse events, the overall frequency of severe adverse events, including myocarditis, was low.

Meaning These data support the safety and efficacy of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines among children aged 5 to 11 years and endorse the universal age-based recommendations.

...

Frank Han MD 🇺🇦Pediatric/ACHD/GUCH Cardiologist Retweeted
Eric Burnett, MD @Doctor_Eric_B | 8:23 AM · Jan 26, 2023:

How on earth was this (BioMed Central) paper published?? Anti-vaxxers surveyed around 2000 people and asked them if they knew people who died from the covid vaccine…from that they concluded the vaccines killed 217k people in the US in the first year…wow

Even if it’s retracted the damage has already been done. This has spread like wildfire in AV circles. Really disappointed in BMC Infectious Diseases.

Alan Plotzker, MD @AlanPlotzker:
Utterly ridiculous. 217k was the LOWER bound on their confidence interval. Their point estimate was 278k, about 8% of ALL deaths, or about as many as die from stroke and Alzheimer’s combined. When you get something so wildly implausible, you need do a sanity check of some kind
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Mark Skidmore* 2023. The role of social circle COVID-19 illness and vaccination experiences in COVID-19 vaccination decisions: an online survey of the United States population. BMC Infectious Diseases volume 23, Article number: 51 (24 Jan 2023) https://bmcinfectdis.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12879-023-07998-3

26 January 2023 Editor's Note: Readers are alerted that the conclusions of this paper are subject to criticisms that are being considered by editors. Specifically, that the claims are unsubstantiated and that there are questions about the quality of the peer review. A further editorial response will follow the resolution of these issues.

* Department of Agricultural, Food and Resource Economics, Department of Economics, Michigan State University, 91 Morrill Hall of Agriculture, East Lansing, MI, 48824-1039, USA

Alastair McAlpine, MD (Paeds infectious diseases MD) @AlastairMcA30 | 12:12 PM · Jan 25, 2023:
https://twitter.com/AlastairMcA30/status/1618295784277159937

We’ve all wondered why scientists or MDs “turn”. How respected folk can find themselves deep in the anti-vax community.

It’s a decidedly simple (but dangerous and malicious) process.
Below is a thread on how people become “red pilled.” 🧵

Imagine you’re a YouTuber and you think you explain science well.
Imagine you’ve built a loyal following on mostly reliable stuff and get 50k-ish views per video.
Now imagine you dip your toe into contrarian waters: there’s this new drug: ivermectin. 🧵 /1

You read a meta-analysis which is favourable and you have on your show an enthusiastic guest with all the right qualifications.
This seems legit! Could this work? Is science missing out on something big? Have you stumbled onto the cure for COVID-19? /2

Suddenly… 700k views! With those extra views comes a SIGNIFICANT bump in revenue. You’re now earning fairly substantial amounts.
You go back to the fuddy, “mainstream” stuff, and interest in your videos tanks. You’re back to 50k again (and minimal cash). /3

So you once again do something controversial. You start “wondering” about the vaccine.
Views skyrocket. People in the comments are telling you what an extraordinary truth-seeker you are. What a great mind. Someone not beholden to “Big Pharma”. /4

Meanwhile, additional evidence has come to light that ivermectin is a bust. That early meta-analysis is flawed and it now seems like your enthusiasm was misplaced.
You can talk about this, but there’s a hitch… /5

Subscribers & views continue to increase rapidly. But it’s clear what they’re there for: C19 contrarianism & skepticism.
You know this from the comments. You know this from the attention you receive from other prominent skeptics & outlets.
Antivax conferences are calling…/5

Suddenly, for the first time, you’re IMPORTANT. Lots of people out there care what you say (in the science world you were small-fry).
You’re on tv. You’re being interviewed. From obscurity, you’re now a *name*.
You’re also making very good money. /6

But you’re not alone. Other folk are also making videos. To stand out, they’re making wilder & wilder claims. So to keep up, you need to escalate.
No more soft-peddling or ambiguity. You go for it. You embrace the antivaccine message. You ignore all those who criticize you. /7

Now it’s too late to turn back.
The science community thinks you’re gone and won’t easily accept you back.
Your viewers expect escalation of your rhetoric. Turning back would bring their scorn and they would leave in droves. /8

I’m addition to YouTube revenues, you are now being contacted by folk in the anti-vaxx community.
You are being offered hefty speaking fees. Additional incentives to host prominent antivaxxers. Advertising and sponsorship.
This could make you rich. /9

You are now trapped. Firmly in the bosom of the antivaxx community, you find yourself standing with conspiracy theorists, germ theory denialists, hardcore right-wingers… and you can’t escape.
There’s nowhere to go. /10

You wonder how you got here. How a combination of YouTube algorithms, a motivated and wealthy anti-vaxx community, the allure of fame and wealth, the blacklisting by mainstream science, all led you to this point.
But here you are… /11

We see the above story play out over & over, with minor variations and changes.
It’s how folk in the science and medical community get “red-pilled” into an antivaxx box that they probably scoffed at a few years ago.
It’s extremely dangerous. And it’s only going to continue./End

>3 margd: I imagine there is some of that....but if you have any integrity though you go with what you know is fact.

Kind of funny. I got Lyme in August and it seemed to trigger some other things with my thyroid and my liver numbers were elevating. My oncologist took me off my chemo med for about a month. In the meantime I did a liver ultrasound, an MRI and a liver biopsy. What came back from all that was my liver was fine....no scarring, no real damage and my liver numbers meanwhile had gone back to normal. So I went back on the chemo but the last test those numbers are rising again so suspicion is it might be the chemo drug and possibly they'll switch me to something else.

In the meantime though my anti-vax sister starts going on about 'have you ever thought that it might be all those vaccines and boosters for covid you've taken?' As a matter of fact I never did think that but still the answer is no--they are not the problem.

>4 lriley: MY dearest anti-vaxxer clings to MMR-vaccine explanation for autism even though Wakefield paper was discredited long ago, and other explanations are being tested. I wonder if one will someday pull her away from MMR-vaxx explanation--and will she survive such a shift in her world view?

The 1995 encephalitis outbreak has mysterious origens. Most scientists say Sar 2 probably has natural origins-however a leaky lab has not been ruled out" Oh yeah, guess where this natural origen originated, a place called Wuhan hmn. implicit in these "incidents" is that lab accidents happen all the time probably closer to you than you want to think about. Swine flu originated in the Soviet Union, killing 700,000 world wide. The characteristics of this Pandemic was that it killed people who were mostly under the age of 25, How convenient. The American Society of Microbiology said this was "probably not a natural event", incidently Swine Flu is another word for H1N1 the infamous 1918 flu. After the last case of small pox a research facility in Enland accidently leaked out the virus (3 times) blaming poor ventalation. Inadequate Vaccines are blamed for causing more outbreaks of encephalitis than the disease itself. SARS has escaped three different times in china in 2002 killing 8,000. In Virginia in 1989 four lab workers contact the Ebola virus experimenting on monkeys. 1979 the deadliest out break of Anthrax excapes from the infamous research lab in Siberia Vector kiling 65. No Carolina Univ Chapel hill the largest reciever of gov research grants 500million looses infected mice on 8 different occasions infected with yup N1H1. 435,000 cases of Lyme's disease last year in just the US, July 29 a house investigation was launched to investigate tick based bioweapons research. How ridiculous you say tiks attacking a peaceful Conn town. 80 years ago the infamous 731 Unit of Imperial Japan infected insects with the plague killing thousands of Chinese. I for one will not be punctured by some under paid Phlebotomist at Walgreens wearing dirty scrubs and shoes, stocking shelves between Jabs....AMDG...

>6 brone: I for one will not be punctured by some under paid Phlebotomist at Walgreens wearing dirty scrubs and shoes, stocking shelves between Jabs.

Only a communist would suggest that free market capitalism wouldn't pay its people enough or insure the absolute safety of anyone using its products. Ahem.

WHO hopes to test an experimental Marburg virus vaccine amid an outbreak in Equatorial Guinea
The World Health Organization convened an urgent meeting to evaluate vaccine candidates after nine deaths and 16 suspected cases were reported.
Aria Bendix | Feb. 14, 2023

...On Tuesday, the WHO convened an urgent meeting to evaluate several possible vaccine candidates that could be administered during the outbreak. The meeting brought together a consortium of vaccine developers, researchers and government officials — a group the WHO created in 2021 to advance a Marburg vaccine...

https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/hopes-test-marburg-virus-vaccine-equa...

>6 brone: I for one will not be punctured by some under paid Phlebotomist at Walgreens wearing dirty scrubs and shoes, stocking shelves between Jabs....AMDG...

This is probably true, anyway. Walgreens is not going to be paying pharmacist wages for shelf stocking.

It's a good line though. You should give credit to whichever blatherer you stole it from.

New Idaho Bill Would Criminalize Anyone Administering Covid-19 mRNA Vaccines
Bruce Y. Lee | Feb 18, 2023

...State Senator Tammy Nichols and State Representative Judy Boyle, both Republicans, have co-sponsored House Bill (HB) 154 for Idaho...“A person may not provide or administer a vaccine developed using messenger ribonucleic acid technology for use in an individual or any other mammal in this state...A person who violates this section is guilty of a misdemeanor.”

...Nichols told the House Health & Welfare Committee, “We have issues (the vaccine) was fast tracked...There are other shots we could utilize that don't have mRNA in it.”

...HB 154 didn’t specifically mention Covid-19 probably because Nichols and Boyle seem to be trying to target future mRNA vaccines as well...flu...cancer...

...Idaho has had the sixth lowest Covid-19 vaccination rates among the U.S. states and territories. Only 56% of the population have been fully vaccinated....meaning the first two doses of Covid-19 vaccine...

https://www.forbes.com/sites/brucelee/2023/02/18/new-idaho-bill-would-criminaliz...

>10 margd:

I find it interesting how US states are so keen to legislate about things. A long state-wide consultation process involving all stakeholders, pro and con? A recommendation that such vaccines should not be used? Stopping them from being used in government funded health facilities? No, straight down to criminalising and fining health providers.

>11 John5918: "conservative", "small government", "Republicans"...

Hopefully, common sense (science?) will prevail.

From Piltdown Man to anti-vaxxers ... What science’s worst hoaxes can teach us (Guardian)

Covid disinformation prompts Royal Society to consider ways of countering forgeries and falsehoods... a special open meeting on “fakes, forgeries and misinformation” at the Royal Society in London on Thursday. Past scientific frauds will be revealed and debates held on the lessons that can be learned from previous hoaxes... “A great deal of disinformation and fraudulent activities went on during the pandemic so this is an appropriate time to think about how science gets at the truth and how it deals with fake news”... previous examples of fake news have taken much longer to be shown to be false. It took decades before the true nature of Britain’s greatest scientific fraud, Piltdown Man, was revealed... “It is also important to understand these issues because we now have new problems relating to the internet, deepfaking and that kind of stuff. People have to be careful about the sources of the information that they are relying on. That has always been a problem”...

Measles Exposure at a Large Gathering in Kentucky, February 2023 and Global Measles Outbreaks
CDC Health Alert Network | March 3, 2023

Summary
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is issuing this Health Alert Network (HAN) Health Advisory to notify clinicians and public health officials about a confirmed measles case at a large gathering. On February 24, 2023, the Kentucky Department for Public Health (KDPH) identified a confirmed case of measles in an unvaccinated individual with a history of recent international travel. While infectious, the individual attended a large religious gathering on February 17–18, 2023, at Asbury University in Wilmore, Kentucky. An estimated 20,000 people attended the gathering from Kentucky, other U.S. states, and other countries during February 17–18, and an undetermined number of these people may have been exposed. This Health Advisory also highlights other recent large global measles outbreaks and associated U.S. importations, and the importance of early recognition, diagnosis, and appropriate treatment. CDC recommends that clinicians be on alert for cases of measles that meet the case definition.

https://emergency.cdc.gov/han/2023.asp

Jonathon P. Leider et al. 2023. The Exodus Of State And Local Public Health Employees: Separations Started Before And Continued Throughout COVID-19. Health Affairs Vol. 42, No. 3: Public Health During COVID-19 & More. PUBLISHED:March 2023. https://doi.org/10.1377/hlthaff.2022.01251 https://www.healthaffairs.org/doi/10.1377/hlthaff.2022.01251

Abstract
...In our analytic sample, nearly half of all employees in state and local public health agencies left between 2017 and 2021, a proportion that rose to three-quarters for those ages thirty-five and younger or with shorter tenures. If separation trends continue, by 2025 this would represent more than 100,000 staff leaving their organizations, or as much as half of the governmental public health workforce in total. Given the likelihood of increasing outbreaks and future global pandemics, strategies to improve recruitment and retention must be prioritized.

HPV vaccine adverse events – study of 11 years of use in Australia
Michael Simpson | 2020-09-27

...the researchers found no concerning issues with HPV vaccine adverse events except for syncope {fainting}, a condition that is frequently observed with all vaccines or procedures that use needles such as blood draws...

https://www.skepticalraptor.com/skepticalraptorblog.php/hpv-vaccine-adverse-even...
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Phillips Aet al. 2020. Adverse events following HPV vaccination: 11 years of surveillance in Australia. Vaccine. 2020 Aug 27;38(38):6038-6046. doi: 10.1016/j.vaccine.2020.06.039. Epub 2020 Jul 22. PMID: 32709432. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32709432/

Dr David Robert Grimes @drg1985 | 7:32 AM · Mar 21, 2023:
Cancer researcher, physicist, scoundrel. Author (#TheIrrationalApe / #GoodThinking). Science, Medicine...

Anti-vaccine activists like Bridgen & Malhotra again quoting fellow crank McCullough to assert COVID vaccines cause 57x increase in miscarriage rate.

With typical miscarriage rate ~15%, these clowns are effectively claiming there's 8.55x more miscarriages than pregnancies.

‘We Were Helpless’: Despair at the C.D.C. as the Pandemic Erupted
Apoorva Mandavilli | March 21, 2023

...Interviews with 11 current and former agency employees, including trainees at the E.I.S., as well as a review of text messages and other documents obtained by The New York Times, portray an agency under intense pressure from the country’s political leaders. Some younger staff members wrestled with guilt, anger and a rising sense of powerlessness as administration officials meddled with or simply disregarded important scientific research...

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/21/health/covid-cdc.html?unlocked_article_code=n...

Inside Ron DeSantis’s Plan to Ride Anti-vaxxism to the White House
Katherine Eban | March 21, 2023

He was for the COVID-19 vaccines before he was against them, but now Florida’s governor is all-in on vaccine skepticism—and hoping to use the issue to outflank Trump on the right. With the presidential primaries looming, and MAGA activists angling to turn Trump against the vaccines he helped fast-track, experts fear anti-vaxxism could soon become an official plank of the Republican Party.

...DeSantis has recruited a host of doctors who are helping him disparage federal health agencies and platform concerns about vaccine safety. Leading the pack is his handpicked surgeon general, Dr. Joseph A. Ladapo, who has recommended against the COVID-19 vaccine for children and claimed, in a widely debunked study, that Pfizer and Moderna’s mRNA vaccines elevate the risk of cardiac-related deaths in young men.

On March 10, the heads of the CDC and FDA rebuked Ladapo for issuing “misinformation.” In a joint four-page public letter,* they wrote, “It is the job of public health officials around the country to protect the lives of the populations they serve, particularly the vulnerable. Fueling vaccine hesitancy undermines this effort.”...

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2023/03/desantis-antivax-florida-trump

* 10 March 2023 letter from CDC and FDA to Joseph A. Ladapo, M.D., Ph.D., State Surgeon General, Florida Department of Health. https://www.fda.gov/media/166159/download

Eric Feigl-Ding (epidemiologist) @DrEricDing | 8:47 AM · Mar 23, 2023:

Escalating risk—“Risk of international spread has not been ruled out”—The ongoing #Marburg outbreak in Equatorial Guinea is significantly larger than has previously been acknowledged, according to new information released by WHO, which warned there may be undetected chains of transmission of the deadly virus in the West African country. Confirmed and probable cases has grown from nine to 29, with cases having been reported in three different provinces over a range of about 90 miles. Some have links to known cases, others do not.

Marburg fever outbreak in Equatorial Guinea widens, WHO reports
In nearly a month, the number of confirmed and probable cases has grown from nine to 29, with cases having been reported in three different provinces over a range of about 90 miles.
Helen Branswell | March 22, 2023
https://statnews.com/2023/03/22/marburg-fever-outbreak-equatorial-guinea-widens/

Covid vaccines and false claims about miscarriage (9:52)
Charlotte McDonald, BBC | 25 Mar 2023

Misinformation around covid-19 and vaccines is rife and as the data available increases, so do often misleading and even wild claims. This week More or Less examines multiple viral claims that the Covid 19 mRNA vaccines increase the risk of miscarriage. To explain where these incorrect figures come from and what the science actually tells us, we are joined by Dr Viki Male, senior lecturer in reproductive immunology at Imperial College London.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0fbsxy2

Illinois’ Bold Move: 60,000 HEPA Air Purifiers To Be Distributed In Schools To Battle Respiratory Viruses
Country Herald Staff Report | March 17, 2023

The Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) is launching a program that will distribute over 60,000 HEPA air purifiers to more than 3,000 Illinois schools to help reduce the transmission of respiratory viruses, including COVID-19. The $29.6 million program is funded by the CDC through the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 and is aimed at school districts serving lower-income communities and counties with elevated air pollution counts.

IDPH estimates that the program will cover 68 percent of school districts in the state, excluding Chicago, which received a separate federal grant. The portable air purifiers will be delivered to school districts in the coming months. Schools will generally be eligible for one small air filter unit for each 20 students in a school, with a limited number of larger units for districts with more than 1,000 students.

The program aims to provide students with a healthy learning environment, regardless of their zip code or income level. IDPH believes that providing schools with air purifiers can significantly reduce the transmission of respiratory viruses, including COVID-19, the flu, and RSV, and reduce absences related to illness.

Studies have shown that cleaner air can improve students’ abilities to think, learn, read, and solve math problems, as well as reduce absentee rates. IDPH issued ventilation guidance last year to educate the community on the impact of ventilation systems and to provide information about low-cost and DIY interventions for ventilation upgrades...

https://www.countryherald.com/news/local/illinois-bold-move-60000-hepa-air-purif...

Does anyone here know of US American big chain-store companies that has installed the ventilation systems that reduce the spread of airborne pathogens?

I'm incredulous looking around, because it seems no one has. Not Target, Walmart, booksellers such as B&N or BAM, or anyone else in the USA. Owner and shareholder profits increased while people have likely been infected in their stores. That happened while none implemented the simplest (possibly most effective) preventative method to reduce illness and death (of employees if no one else!)?

I'll take my CO2 monitor next time I'm in a pharmacy. My dentist's office as well as MD exam room, waiting room and even downstairs lab were well bellow 800 ppm. Hospital good except for elevator.. The three big box stores I tested varied, so I always wear mask to shop. A couple of hotel rooms were 1100 when we arrived, so we always open doors and windows upon arrival, and run bathroom exhaust. You're right, though that pharmacies should make extra effort, given their clientele...drive-thru might be worth the effort?

In a sceptical era, understand this: vaccines do work - and our children need them (Guardian)

Covid accelerated a decline in vaccinations in England. We have to make a stronger case for them, and ensure everyone can get them...

Rachel Clarke @doctor_oxford | 4:42 PM · May 14, 2019:
Palliative care doctor 👩🏻‍⚕️ Writer 📚 NHS

A visual argument for vaccines, in five tweets:

1/ A ward of polio victims, incarcerated inside "iron lungs" in 1950s America. Many are children, their lungs paralysed, unable to breathe unaided. Thanks to vaccination, no-one has caught polio in the UK since the 1980s.
Photo iron lungs polio ( https://twitter.com/doctor_oxford/status/1128400180443734016/photo/1 )

2/ Roald Dahl with his beloved daughter, Olivia, who died, aged 7, from measles. He wrote:
“'Are you feeling all right?' I asked her.
'I feel all sleepy,' she said.
In an hour, she was unconscious. In twelve hours she was dead."
Family photo ( https://twitter.com/doctor_oxford/status/1128400867923771392/photo/1 )

3/ 82,500. The number of measles cases in Europe in 2018. That is 3x as many as in 2017, and an astonishing 15x as many as in 2016.
Last year, measles caused 72 avoidable deaths in Europe. Many victims were children.

4/ Cervical cancer. The latest research shows that in the last decade, the new HPV vaccine has caused an astonishing 90% fall in rates of pre-cancerous cells in vaccinated young women.
Photo cervix w lesions ( https://twitter.com/doctor_oxford/status/1128401547950481408/photo/1 )

5/ Smallpox. A horrific disease, now eradicated, thanks to vaccination. Its mortality rate was 30% - and even higher in babies. Survivors had extensive skin scarring. Many were left blind.
Photo smallpox victim ( https://twitter.com/doctor_oxford/status/1128401907649863682/photo/1 )

>26 margd: Roald Dahl with his beloved daughter, Olivia, who died, aged 7, from measles.

Reminds me of a friend, an Anglican missionary, who was working in Zimbabwe alongside a Zimbabwean priest. Both of them had young sons about the same age, who played together all the time. There was an outbreak of measles in the region. My friend's son, fully vaccinated in UK, felt under the weather for a couple of days and then was fine. When my friend asked his Zimbabwean colleague, "How's your son getting on?", the simple reply was, "He died". In many countries in the Global South vaccines are not readily available. So children die. Living in Africa, it really is difficult to understand how people who have easy access to these life-saving vaccinations reject them, while people who would love to have vaccinations for their children are often deprived of them.

>27 John5918: Measles is even more dangerous in areas where other pathogens are in circulation and health care is less available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_rkOpdgZLc (4:36)

tern @1goodtern | 6:59 AM · Apr 6, 2023:
Guess which age group in the UK is under vaccinated.
The toxic minimisers did this...

Covid deaths as % of total deaths, by age, England and Wales, 2023
( https://twitter.com/1goodtern/status/1643931359524671489/photo/1 *)

The blame for this should fall precisely at the feet of the jcvi.*

And please please please do not forget that every individual death of a child is only the tip of the iceberg.
For every death there are more kids left disabled.
For every death there are more kids with severe illnesses and kids hospitalised.

* James Neill - 🇺🇦💙 🇪🇺🇮🇪🇬🇧🔶 jneill | 4:54 AM · Apr 6, 2023:
(creator of the graph)
🚨 Children rarely die of anything, thankfully.
But Covid is STILL a significant cause of child deaths.
More so than for many other age groups.

** The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) advises UK health departments on immunisation.

Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV): vaccine administered during pregnancy was effective against medically attended severe RSV-associated lower respiratory tract illness in infants, and no safety concerns were identified.

Beate Kampmann @BeateKampmann | 3:47 AM · Apr 6, 2023:
Infectious diseases paediatrician, Director of the Vaccine Centre @LSHTM_Vaccines, leading vaccine research at MRC Unit the Gambia at London School of Trop Med

very happy to see our international study out in @NEJM today showing that #RSV vaccination in pregnancy protects over 80% of infants against severe disease. Multi-country effort and great local team @mrcunitgambia @IMPRINT_network

Beate Kampmann et al. 2023. Bivalent Prefusion F Vaccine in Pregnancy to Prevent RSV Illness in Infants. NEJM April 5, 2023. DOI: 10.1056/NEJMoa2216480 https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2216480

Abstract
Background
Whether vaccination during pregnancy could reduce the burden of respiratory syncytial virus (RSV)–associated lower respiratory tract illness in newborns and infants is uncertain.

Methods
In this phase 3, double-blind trial conducted in 18 countries, we randomly assigned, in a 1:1 ratio, pregnant women at 24 through 36 weeks’ gestation to receive a single intramuscular injection of 120 μg of a bivalent RSV prefusion F protein–based (RSVpreF) vaccine or placebo. The two primary efficacy end points were medically attended severe RSV-associated lower respiratory tract illness and medically attended RSV-associated lower respiratory tract illness in infants within 90, 120, 150, and 180 days after birth. A lower boundary of the confidence interval for vaccine efficacy ... greater than 20% was considered to meet the success criterion for vaccine efficacy with respect to the primary end points.

Results
At this prespecified interim analysis, the success criterion for vaccine efficacy was met with respect to one primary end point. Overall, 3682 maternal participants received vaccine and 3676 received placebo; 3570 and 3558 infants, respectively, were evaluated. Medically attended severe lower respiratory tract illness occurred within 90 days after birth in 6 infants of women in the vaccine group and 33 infants of women in the placebo group (vaccine efficacy, 81.8% ...); 19 cases and 62 cases, respectively, occurred within 180 days after birth (vaccine efficacy, 69.4%...). Medically attended RSV-associated lower respiratory tract illness occurred within 90 days after birth in 24 infants of women in the vaccine group and 56 infants of women in the placebo group (vaccine efficacy, 57.1%...); these results did not meet the statistical success criterion. No safety signals were detected in maternal participants or in infants and toddlers up to 24 months of age. The incidences of adverse events reported within 1 month after injection or within 1 month after birth were similar in the vaccine group (13.8% of women and 37.1% of infants) and the placebo group (13.1% and 34.5%, respectively).

Conclusions
RSVpreF vaccine administered during pregnancy was effective against medically attended severe RSV-associated lower respiratory tract illness in infants, and no safety concerns were identified. (Funded by Pfizer; MATISSE ClinicalTrials.gov number, NCT04424316. opens in new tab.)

World Health Organization (WHO) WHO | 5:56 AM · Apr 7, 2023:

Pharaoh Ramses V comes to life. Watch this fascinating story about the eradication of a deadly disease. #SMALLPOX!
Did you know?
Following an ambitious 12-year global vaccination campaign led by WHO, smallpox is finally eradicated in 1980. 🙌

2:50 ( https://twitter.com/WHO/status/1644277941180809219 )

Tanja A. Stamm et al. 2023. Determinants of COVID-19 vaccine fatigue. Nature Medicine (27 March 2023) https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-023-02282-y

Abstract
There is growing concern that Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccine fatigue will be a major obstacle in maintaining immunity in the general population. In this study, we assessed vaccine acceptance in future scenarios in two conjoint experiments, investigating determinants such as new vaccines, communication, costs/incentives and legal rules. The experiments were embedded in an online survey (n = 6,357 participants) conducted in two European countries (Austria and Italy). Our results suggest that vaccination campaigns should be tailored to subgroups based on their vaccination status. Among the unvaccinated, campaign messages conveying community spirit had a positive effect (0.343...), whereas offering positive incentives, such as a cash reward (0.722...) or voucher (0.670...), was pivotal to the decision-making of those vaccinated once or twice. Among the triple vaccinated, vaccination readiness increased when adapted vaccines were offered (0.279...), but costs (−0.795...) and medical dissensus (−0.161...) reduced their likelihood to get vaccinated. We conclude that failing to mobilize the triple vaccinated is likely to result in booster vaccination rates falling short of expectations. For long-term success, measures fostering institutional trust should be considered. These results provide guidance to those responsible for future COVID-19 vaccination campaigns.

Likely a cause of MS, looks like a vaccine for Epstein Barr Virus is in the works!

Michael Knigge @kniggem | 9:01 PM · Apr 11, 2023:
Journalist from Germany in America.

EBViously, a spin-off from Helmholtz, Germany’s largest research organization has identified the first vaccine candidate EBV-001 for the Epstein-Barr virus. Clinicial trials to start in 2024.

https://dzif.de/en/dzif-project-derived-start-ebviously-announces-first-details-...
Image

>2 margd: contd.

Column: Anti-vaxxers loved to cite this study of COVID vaccine deaths. Now it’s been retracted
Michael HiltzikBusiness Columnist
April 11, 2023

...BMC Infectious Diseases retracted the {by economist Mark Skidmore of Michigan State University} study {estimating the number of U.S. deaths from {COVID} vaccines at 278,000} on Tuesday, specifically citing doubts about “the validity of the conclusions” related to death statistics because of flaws in its methodology. Skidmore disagrees with the retraction.

The retraction, which followed months of dickering between Skidmore and the journal’s editor over the nature and text of the retraction notice, points to some important questions about how the spread of misinformation about COVID affects public health.

It also raises questions about how the piece got published in the first place. As Stephanie M. Lee of the Chronicle of Higher Education has pointed out, the flaws in Skidmore’s paper were virtually self-evident from the moment it reached print.

Veteran pseudoscience debunker David Gorski identified them within a day of its official publication, calling the paper “antivax propaganda disguised as a survey,” noting Skidmore’s record of anti-vaccine commentary, and asking: “How on earth did BMC Infectious Diseases publish such dreck?”...

https://www.latimes.com/business/story/2023-04-11/anti-vaxxers-loved-to-cite-thi...

Ghana first to approve Oxford's malaria vaccine
Natalie Grover and Jennifer Rigby | 13 April 2023

...The WHO said last month that in the areas where the vaccine has been given, all-cause child mortality has dropped by 10%, a sign of its impact...

https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/ghana-first-approve-...

Eric Topol (Scripps)@EricTopol | 11:05 AM · Apr 17, 2023:

The mRNA cancer vaccines are starting to click and there's considerable room for improvement (new review article)

Moderna, Merck Show Progress Toward Cancer Vaccines
An mRNA shot helped prevent relapse in high-risk melanoma patients
Brianna Abbott | Updated April 16, 2023
https://www.wsj.com/articles/moderna-shows-progress-toward-cancer-vaccines-27ff6...

Text excerpt WSJ ( https://twitter.com/EricTopol/status/1647979575383846912/photo/1 )
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Theresa M. Raimondo et al. 2023. Delivering the next generation of cancer immunotherapies with RNA (Commentary). Cell Volume 186, ISSUE 8, P1535-1540, April 13, 2023. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cell.2023.02.031 https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(23)00209-X

Decades of oncologic clinical use have demonstrated that cancer immunotherapy provides unprecedented therapeutic benefits. Tragically, only a minority of patients respond to existing immunotherapies. RNA lipid nanoparticles have recently emerged as modular tools for immune stimulation. Here, we discuss advancements in RNA-based cancer immunotherapies and opportunities for improvement...

Figure 1RNA lipid nanoparticles (LNPs) are modular tools that can be engineered to precisely tune immune responses
https://twitter.com/EricTopol/status/1647979575383846912/photo/2

Possible links between Covid shots and tinnitus emerge
People who have developed life-altering ringing in their ears following a Covid vaccine demand deeper investigation into this potential side effect.
Erika Edwards | 23 April 2023
https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/covid-vaccine-side-effects-tinnitus-m...

WHO Iraq @WHOIraq | 5:01 AM · Apr 24, 2023:

On this day 22 years ago, this devoted vaccinator navigated through marshes in #Iraq to provide life-saving vaccines to children in hard-to-reach areas.

As we mark #WorldImmunizationWeek, let's salute unsung heroes dedicated to achieving #HealthForAll.

Photo ( https://twitter.com/WHOIraq/status/1650424685828423687/photo/1 )

Canada as well as Europe was short on these kid's meds last fall. US, too, though nor as desperately so(?)
Familes w infants and kids who can't choke down or chew a tablet might want to pick up some liquid ibuprofen and/ or acetaminophen now. (One of my young sons spiked fevers ~105F, so I consider liquid acetaminophen a miracle drug!)

European pediatricians warn of impending medication shortage
DW | April 29, 2023

Thomas Fischbach, president of the German federation of doctors for children and adolescents, the BKVJ, is among several European physicians warning of a "considerable shortage" of medicines for children that is liable to get worse later in the year as the colder weather returns.

"Autumn is not far away. We will again face a supply shortage that could be even worse than last time," Fischbach told the Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung (NOZ).

Germany and other European countries sufered similar problems last winter.

Fischbach is one of the co-signatories of an open letter of the pediatricians from Germany, France, Austria and Switzerland to the health ministers of these countries, such as Karl Lauterbach in Berlin, urging them to try to avoid a repeat of the phenomenon.

The doctors warn there is a lack of fever and pain medication in child-friendly dosage forms while penicillin is also currently not available...

https://www.dw.com/en/european-pediatricians-warn-of-impending-medication-shorta...

Oh darn, just had a 4 pm vaxx... Next time: AM!

Science Magazine @ScienceMagazine | 12:30 PM · Apr 29, 2023:

Last year, a @SciImmunology review highlighted the benefits of morning vaccination compared with afternoon/evening vaccination in humans.

Learn more: https://scim.ag/2qh #DayOfImmunology

Infographic BCG (TB), flu, COVID vaxx am and pm
https://twitter.com/ScienceMagazine/status/1652349552463060992/photo/1 )

>40 margd: My wife and I had an 11am yesterday. I'm probably in double figures at this point for covid vaccinations. My situation is different though than most people's. That said all the vaccine misinformation coming mostly from the right has been a big issue and I have no doubt that it's cost some people their lives and others their health. Occasionally someone does have a reaction to these vaccines but they're kind of rare.

Rachel Schraer (BBC News) @rachelschraer | 5:03 AM · May 2, 2023

Made my @BBCNewsnight debut on Friday with report about a conspiracy film which is leading bereaved people to be harassed.

“Died Suddenly” uses fabricated evidence and manipulated data to claim falsely that Covid vaccines are killing millions

https://bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m001lf7k {only available in UK}
1:32 excerpt ( https://twitter.com/rachelschraer/status/1653324199405006849 )

In a world first, RSV vaccine wins FDA approval for adults 60 and up
Beth Mole - 5/4/2023
https://arstechnica.com/science/2023/05/in-a-world-first-rsv-vaccines-wins-fda-a...
---------------------------------------------

ETA:

Alberto Papi et al. 2023. Respiratory Syncytial Virus Prefusion F Protein Vaccine in Older Adults. N Engl J Med, February 16, 2023 ; 388:595-608. DOI: 10.1056/NEJMoa2209604. https://www.nejm.org/doi/10.1056/NEJMoa2209604

UNICEF: More than 1 million polio vaccines destroyed in Sudan (Reuters)

More than 1 million polio vaccines intended for children have been destroyed as a result of looting in Sudan during the upsurge in violence since April, the U.N. children's agency UNICEF told Reuters on Friday. "A number of cold chain facilities have been looted, damaged and destroyed, including over a million polio vaccines in South Darfur"... The agency was in the middle of a series of polio vaccination campaigns in Sudan following an outbreak at the end of 2022. Polio, a disease which mainly affects children under 5, can lead to paralysis and death. Africa was declared free of wild polio in 2020 but Malawi, Mozambique and Sudan have reported imported cases since last year...

Prof Gavin Yamey MD MPH (Duke U) @GYamey | 1:39 PM · May 8, 2023

What an extraordinary public health achievement

In this Swedish study, the risk of invasive cervical cancer among those who received the HPV vaccine before the age of 17 was almost 90% lower than among those who had never been vaccinated

Graph ( https://twitter.com/GYamey/status/1655628416622768128 )
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Jiayao Lei et al. 2023. HPV Vaccination and the Risk of Invasive Cervical Cancer. N Engl J Med 1 Oct 2020; 83:1340-1348
DOI: 10.1056/NEJMoa1917338 https://nejm.org/doi/10.1056/NEJMoa1917338

British Society for Immunology @britsocimm | 3:58 AM · May 17, 2023

Today is the birthday of #EdwardJenner, the British scientist who pioneered #vaccination 🥳
Let’s #CelebrateVaccines to help strengthen public understanding so everyone can make informed decisions ℹ️
Our resources are free to use & share 👉https://bit.ly/3Hzricy 1/4
How do vaccines work? ( https://twitter.com/britsocimm/status/1658743887266029574/photo/1 )

Routine #vaccinations are important to protect our families against serious diseases 🛡️
Discover our educational games, animations & infographics around how #VaccinesWork 👉https://bit.ly/3WD7bi4 2/4
What is herd immunity? ( https://twitter.com/britsocimm/status/1658744355329302529/photo/1 )

We want to address #vaccine concerns that parents & carers may have 💭❓
Our guide to childhood #vaccinations contains lots of reliable information 👉 https://bit.ly/455bTui 3/4

Are you over 65 & been offered the pneumococcal & #shingles vaccines?
Check out our guide to #vaccinations for older adults for answers to common questions on routine #vaccines available in the UK 👉https://bit.ly/3nsrH96 4/4
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"we have translated some of our educational resources on immunity, COVID-19 and vaccines into different languages, including Arabic, French, German, Greek, Irish, Italian, Kurdish, Lithuanian, Polish, Spanish, Turkish, Ukrainian, Welsh and Yiddish."

https://www.immunology.org/public-information/vaccine-resources/vaccine-resource...

Viki Male @VikiLovesFACS | 2:28 AM · May 17, 2023:
Immunologist working on pregnancy at @ImperialCollege

Morning Craig. The claims made in that video* aren’t true. In fact, COVID vaccination in pregnancy protects against severe disease and stillbirth, which is why obstetricians and midwives recommend it.

Quote Tweet
Viki Male @VikiLovesFACS · 4h

...Studies that have looked to see if active vaccine crosses the placenta find no evidence it does, and…
https://nature.com/articles/s41577-022-00703-6

Studies of more than 360,000 people vaccinated in pregnancy find it doesn’t increase the risk of any pregnancy problem.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/19FNXcmdI0MU6RPmvKYo_g9zEWPKl2-l760OX_8zww3E/...

Safety COVID & vaxx in pregnancy ( https://twitter.com/VikiLovesFACS/status/1658720389332180992/photo/1 )
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* Vaccine Mandates Took a Toll on Pregnant Women and Their Babies: Here’s What Happened
Children’s Health Defense @ChildrensHD
1:14 ( https://twitter.com/ChildrensHD/status/1658585254725140482 )

Americans’ Largely Positive Views of Childhood Vaccines Hold Steady
Fewer than half in U.S. rate COVID-19 vaccines as having high health benefits, low risk of side effects
Cary Funk, Alec Tyson, Brian Kennedy and Giancarlo Pasquini | May 16, 2023

...The {PEW Research} Center survey finds 88% of Americans say the benefits of childhood vaccines for measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) outweigh the risks, compared with just 10% who say the risks outweigh the benefits. The share expressing confidence in the value of MMR vaccines is identical to the share who said this in 2019, before the coronavirus outbreak.

...There are signs that the coronavirus outbreak has influenced the public’s thinking on one important aspect of childhood vaccines: requirements for children to attend public schools.

Seven-in-ten Americans now say healthy children should be required to be vaccinated in order to attend public schools. This is a smaller majority than the 82% who supported vaccine requirements for children in 2019 and 2016. The share who say parents should be able to decide not to vaccinate their children now stands at 28%, up 12 points from four years ago. This data mirrors a December 2022 KFF update of these Pew Research Center trends.

The decline in support for vaccine requirements for children has been driven by changing views among Republicans

...White evangelical Protestants – a largely Republican group — have also become much less supportive of vaccine requirements in public schools.

...Fewer than half of U.S. adults believe the preventative health benefits of COVID-19 vaccines are high (45%).

...Americans also see a greater risk of side effects attached to COVID-19 vaccines...

https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2023/05/16/americans-largely-positive-views-...

Tyler P. Moore et al. 2023. State Policy Removing the Personal Belief Exemption for Measles, Mumps, and Rubella (MMR) School Immunization Requirement, Washington State, 2014–2022. American Journal of Public Health (ajph) Published online ahead of print May 18, 2023:e1–e10. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2023.307285 https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/10.2105/AJPH.2023.307285

Objectives. To assess the impact of Washington State’s 2019 Engrossed House Bill (EHB) 1638—which removed measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) personal belief exemptions—on MMR vaccine series completion and exemption rates in K–12 students.

Methods. We used interrupted time-series analyses to examine changes in MMR vaccine series completion rates before and after EHB 1638 was passed and the χ2 test for differences in exemption rates.

Results. EHB 1638 implementation was associated with a 5.4% relative increase in kindergarten MMR vaccine series completion rates ..., and results were similar with Oregon as a control state (no change observed in Oregon; P = .68). MMR exemptions overall decreased 41% (from 3.1% in 2018–2019 to 1.8% in 2019–2020...), and religious exemptions increased 367% (from 0.3% to 1.4%...).

Conclusions. EHB 1638 was associated with an increase in MMR vaccine series completion rates and a decrease in any MMR exemption. However, effects were partially offset by an increase in religious exemption rates.

Public Health Implications. Removal of personal belief exemptions for the MMR immunization requirement only may be an effective approach to increase MMR vaccine coverage rates statewide and among underimmunized communities.

Shingles vaxx Zostavax reduces risk Alzheimer's (women esp) ~20% over 7 yrs. Shingrix, now covered under US Medicare, is even more effective in suppressing shingles?

Pascal Geldsetzer @PGeldsetzer1 | 12:50 PM · May 25, 2023:
Assistant Professor of Medicine and, by courtesy, of Epidemiology and Population Health, Stanford University; CZ Biohub – San Francisco investigator
https://twitter.com/PGeldsetzer1/status/1661776663074738176
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Markus Eyting et al. 2023. Causal evidence that herpes zoster vaccination prevents a proportion of dementia cases. medRxiv 25 May 2023. doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2023.05.23.23290253 https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2023.05.23.23290253v1

This article is a preprint and has not been certified by peer review

Abstract
The root causes of dementia are still largely unclear, and the medical community lacks highly effective preventive and therapeutic pharmaceutical agents for dementia despite large investments into their development. There is growing interest in the question if infectious agents play a role in the development of dementia, with herpesviruses attracting particular attention. To provide causal as opposed to merely correlational evidence on this question, we take advantage of the fact that in Wales eligibility for the herpes zoster vaccine (Zostavax) for shingles prevention was determined based on an individual's exact date of birth. Those born before September 2 1933 were ineligible and remained ineligible for life, while those born on or after September 2 1933 were eligible to receive the vaccine. By using country-wide data on all vaccinations received, primary and secondary care encounters, death certificates, and patients' date of birth in weeks, we first show that the percentage of adults who received the vaccine increased from 0.01% among patients who were merely one week too old to be eligible, to 47.2% among those who were just one week younger. Apart from this large difference in the probability of ever receiving the herpes zoster vaccine, there is no plausible reason why those born just one week prior to September 2 1933 should differ systematically from those born one week later. We demonstrate this empirically by showing that there were no systematic differences (e.g., in pre-existing conditions or uptake of other preventive interventions) between adults across the date-of-birth eligibility cutoff, and that there were no other interventions that used the exact same date-of-birth eligibility cutoff as was used for the herpes zoster vaccine program. This unique natural randomization, thus, allows for robust causal, rather than correlational, effect estimation. We first replicate the vaccine's known effect from clinical trials of reducing the occurrence of shingles. We then show that receiving the herpes zoster vaccine reduced the probability of a new dementia diagnosis over a follow-up period of seven years by 3.5 percentage points (95% CI: 0.6 - 7.1, p=0.019), corresponding to a 19.9% relative reduction in the occurrence of dementia. Besides preventing shingles and dementia, the herpes zoster vaccine had no effects on any other common causes of morbidity and mortality. In exploratory analyses, we find that the protective effects from the vaccine for dementia are far stronger among women than men. Randomized trials are needed to determine the optimal population groups and time interval for administration of the herpes zoster vaccine to prevent or delay dementia, as well as to quantify the magnitude of the causal effect when more precise measures of cognition are used. Our findings strongly suggest an important role of the varicella zoster virus in the etiology of dementia.

A vaccine for pancreatic cancer?
Anna Carthaus | 05/24/2023

Nine out of ten people do not survive pancreatic cancer, and the survival rate has not improved for almost 60 years. There are hardly any effective treatment options. That's why every advance in therapy is a revolution. And that is exactly what is happening now.

Researchers in the US treated 16 pancreatic cancer patients with a personalized mRNA vaccine after they had their tumors surgically removed. By the end of the 18-month trial period, half of the patients had not relapsed. For a cancer that usually returns within a few months of surgery, that's a huge success...

https://www.dw.com/en/a-vaccine-for-pancreatic-cancer/a-65705453
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Luis A. Rojas et al. 2023. Personalized RNA neoantigen vaccines stimulate T cells in pancreatic cancer. Nature 10 May 2023. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-023-06063-y#Sec7

>50 margd: I've been on valcyclovir an anti-shingles medication ever since my cancer treatment started. I've also had shingrix shots. My wife has had those shots too. For her they smarted for a couple/three days. I didn't have that issue. That said I've been a bit of a pincushion for a while. I don't seem to get these reactions from shots.

>52 lriley: Valcyclovir might protect you from other Herpes viruses as well. (I have Rx for rare outbreaks of cold sores--works great!) I read years ago that the two Herpes simplex (cold sores and genital Herpes), and CMV (cytomegalovirus, which almost all adults have had) were associated w later dementia. Old study, but apparently risk was increased by 5% if one has had one of those viruses, 25% if two, and 40% if all four.

Epstein Barr Virus is associated w later increase in risk for multiple sclerosis.
Measles erases immune memory, which takes several years to recover.
COVID results in astonishing amount of Long Covid, with longterm consequences for some ...

Any small risk from vaccines needs to be balanced against preventing later outcomes from viruses, as well as immediate disease!

>53 margd: all that is good to know. They’ve put off the MMR shot until after the clinical trial I’m in which could end in August. Sometimes participants are asked to go further than the two years. My guess is it will end but…..we’ll see. Generally I think I’ve handled it well but I do have some neuropathy in my feet which could be because of the chemo or could be because of the two fractured vertebra from a couple years back. I’ve been to a podiatrist who set up an EMG test the results of which were inconclusive……the next step would be to see a neurologist. If it’s the chemo the oncologists think it would be the valtrex/valcade I had prior to the transplant and less likely the revlimid/lenalidomide I’m taking currently. If I come off the trial there’s some chance I will come off the chemo too. That will depend on what they see from the bone marrow biopsy that happens also in August.

>54 lriley: Feet can be a misery! What a journey you've been on--not for the faint of heart. Hope normalcy returns soon.

How the Stigma of Herpes Harms Patients and Stymies Research for a Cure
Isabella Backman | May 25, 2023

...Lack of Funding Hinders Herpes Vaccine Research

For decades, scientists have tried and failed to develop vaccines for herpes. The evasive nature of the virus makes it notoriously difficult to treat. But in her lab at Yale, {Akiko} Iwasaki has discovered promising clues for an effective vaccination.

Conventional vaccines boost immunity by triggering antibody development. But after vaccinating mice for HSV-2 {genital Herpes} with conventional vaccines, Iwasaki’s team learned that the animals failed to develop T cells or antibodies in the genital tract. In addition, the virus displays molecules that inactivate antibodies from attacking the virus. The limited access of T cells and antibodies to the viral entry site, and the antibody evasion strategies, likely explain why previous herpes vaccines have failed.

Based on that insight, roughly a decade ago the team developed a vaccine strategy called “prime-and-pull.” Through this mechanism, the researchers used a vaccine to generate T cell immunity in guinea pigs (prime). Then, they used a cream that can induce chemokines—signaling molecules that can direct immune cells toward an infected site—to attract the T cells into the vaginal tissue (pull).

The strategy was a success—the team found that their vaccine could shut down the reactivation of herpes in infected guinea pigs. But the lack of funding has brought their work to a halt. “We’re looking for partners to be able to take this to humans, and that’s been the bottleneck ever since,” Iwasaki says.

She believes the stigma around sexually transmitted diseases is likely one of the obstacles to getting her vaccine funded. Research shows that the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine Gardasil, for example, is dramatically effective in preventing cervical cancer—reducing rates in women by nearly 90 percent. But despite its benefits, convincing parents to vaccinate their children is challenging, experts say.

“We have this fabulous anti-cancer vaccine designed to wipe out cervical cancer. But parents will see that it is ‘an STD vaccine’ and think we’re accusing their son or daughter of being high-risk sexually,” says Sten Vermund, MD, PhD, Anna M.R. Lauder Professor of Public Health. “I tell them that HPV is so ubiquitous and easy to contract that most women will acquire it at some point in their life. It’s not a marker of unsafe sex, but many parents still refuse.”

A herpes vaccine may face similar resistance, making it economically unattractive for the drug industry. “When pharmaceutical companies need to pour millions of dollars into developing a vaccine, if the uptake is going to be low, the profit doesn’t justify the effort,” says Iwasaki. “This makes STD vaccines difficult, even for something so obviously beneficial, safe, and effective as Gardasil.”

As interest in mRNA vaccines grows post-COVID, Moderna and Pfizer have begun working on such a vaccine for herpes. But in a recent talk to the World Health Organization (WHO), Iwasaki warned of the limitations of mRNA vaccines in treating herpes. “If you just make a vaccine without thinking about the mucosal tissue, it’s not going to work,” she said. “Just making an intra-muscular vaccine alone—I think it will be very difficult for such a vaccine to be effective.”...

https://medicine.yale.edu/news-article/how-the-stigma-of-herpes-harms-patients-a...

World Health Organization (WHO) WHO | 9:24 AM · May 27, 2023:

📌 The mRNA hub in South Africa was established to build vaccine production capacity and enhance outbreak response in low- or middle-income countries. In 2022, the hub’s manufacturing process was developed, and mRNA technology started to be transferred from the hub to 15 spokes across all WHO regions

Announced on 21 June 2021, the objective of the technology transfer hub is to build capacity in low- and middle-income countries to produce mRNA vaccines through a centre of excellence and training (the mRNA vaccine technology hub). The hub is located at Afrigen, Cape Town, South Africa, and will work with a network of technology recipients (spokes) in low- and middle-income countries.

Vaccines Did Not Cause Rachel's Autism: My Journey as a Vaccine Scientist, Pediatrician, and Autism Dad
by Peter J Hotez

West Nile virus may be deadlier than thought
Infected people may die years after they seem to have recovered
Kai Kupferschmidt | 14 Nov 2016

...West Nile fever was long thought to be a manageable public health problem. The mosquito-borne virus—a relative of the Zika and yellow fever viruses—causes symptoms in just one out of every five infected people. Most of those experience fever and a flulike illness. But in some patients, the virus also infects the central nervous system, which can be fatal. Patients who survive tend to do worse later in life...

...Kristy Murray, a researcher at the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas, and her colleagues went through all 4162 cases of West Nile virus reported to the Texas Department of State Health Services for the more than 10 years between July 2002 and December 2012. They found that 557 patients had died: 289 of them in the first 90 days after infection, and 268 people after. Not all the later deaths resulted from West Nile. But patients who had neurological infections had a higher risk of dying of some other diseases than the general population. For instance, they were almost five times as likely to die of kidney problems and more than twice as likely to die from an infectious disease, Murray found. The effect was particularly pronounced in patients younger than 60. "This shows in a large population size that mortality does increase greatly in the first 6 years after infection", Murray says...

...Murray says her finding also underscores the need to fight the virus, which continues to infect thousands of people in the United States annually. "We really need to push for a vaccine."

https://www.science.org/content/article/west-nile-virus-may-be-deadlier-thought

Three New Studies Show the COVID Vaccines Are Very Safe for Children
Jonathan Howard | June 11, 2023

Three new studies tell us what we already knew- vaccine isn’t perfect, but it’s far safer than the virus for children...

https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/3newstudies/

🆕 @PNASNews
The future of vaccines is "tolerogenic" —towards preventing or treating autoimmune diseases. A new report of preventing autoimmune (rheumatoid-like) arthritis in the experimental model via targeting auto- reactive T cells
Text highlighted 1st page ( https://twitter.com/EricTopol/status/1668345244902113285/photo/1 )
-- Eric Topol (Scripps) @EricTopol | 3:51 PM · Jun 12, 2023

Vilma Urbonaviciute et al. 2023. Therapy targeting antigen-specific T cells by a peptide-based tolerizing vaccine against autoimmune arthritis. PNAS June 12, 2023. 120 (25) e2218668120. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2218668120 https://pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.2218668120

Significance
Current treatments of autoimmune diseases, like rheumatoid arthritis, is directed to inflammatory consequences of the disease process, with limitations regarding effectiveness and side effects. We have shown in vivo {mouse model} a highly effective tolerogenic vaccine, which consists of a complex between an antigenic glycopeptide from COL2 and a relevant MHCII molecule. The vaccine operates through binding directly to the T cell receptor on the T cell surface, leading to differentiation of the T cell into a distinct regulatory phenotype mediating a dominant tissue-specific tolerance.

...the tolerogenic approach described here may be a promising dominant antigen-specific therapy for rheumatoid arthritis, and in principle, for autoimmune diseases in general.

What Wildfire Smoke, Gas Stoves and Covid Tell Us About Our Air
Linsey Marr | June 7, 2023
Dr. Marr is an engineering professor at Virginia Tech, where she studies the airborne transmission of viruses.

...As we emerge from a pandemic caused by an airborne virus to skies darkened by wildfires, we cannot return to ignorance and complacency about our air. Through a combination of greater public awareness, more widespread implementation of filtration and other air-cleaning technologies and government guidance, we can move into a new era of cleaner air.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention took a first step when it released a new recommendation for buildings to aim for at least five air changes per hour to reduce the risk of virus transmission. We need to expand recommendations such as these to address human health more broadly, not just for respiratory infections. This is especially important in schools, where children spend long hours in classrooms that often have insufficient ventilation.

Improved indoor air quality will not only reduce disease but also improve other aspects of our lives, allowing us to be our best selves. If air pollution isn’t detracting from our health, we can run our fastest race, perform our best on an exam or be well enough to enjoy a few extra days with our loved ones. As the saying goes, we wouldn’t accept a glass full of dirty water, and we should no longer accept a lungful of dirty air.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/07/opinion/wildfire-smoke-air-quality-viruses.ht...

Cat🗿🐞🦴🕷️🐈🐘 @MsAmitripped | 8:17 AM · Jun 25, 2023:
Anatomist~Forensic Anthropology🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿
https://twitter.com/MsAmitripped/status/1672941964017139712

Well, looks like it's time for me to do a big 🧵on why autism isn't brain damage, and why vaccines don't cause autism.
...

(2) So what is autism? It's a neurological disorder/difference, which presents itself with a myriad of varied symptoms, behavioural changes, social difficulties, intellectual differences, and sensory issues, which show in differing ways. Autistic people come in every demographic

(3) The leading theory on autism involves synaptic dysregulation, where the synapses that are usually pruned in a young toddler, are not pruned in the autistic child. Synaptic formation and regulation is complex, with multiple genes and enzymes involved.

Thomas C. Südhof 2021. The cell biology of synapse formation. J Cell Biol. 2021 Jul 5; 220(7): e202103052.
Published online 2021 Jun 4. doi: 10.1083/jcb.202103052 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8186004/#:~:text=After%20neurons%20...

(4) Synapse dysregulation has been found in ASD, as can be seen from some of the studies -

1-https://cell.com/neuron/fulltext/S0896-6273(14)00651-5

2-https://nature.com/articles/nrn3992

3-https://sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S030439401830079X?casa_token=3huTL007arAAAAAA:Czn6pSPIoOsd3_KKmCq0XYFJYyeQbgr11axhClGzLehuLUKzeboX6MlY8imwVtiPhurPqigEwA

And linked to the same genes that lead to fragile X syndrome - https://sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0896627319302065

Bagni and Zukin 2019> A Synaptic Perspective of Fragile X Syndrome and Autism Spectrum Disorders. Neuron
Volume 101, Issue 6, 20 March 2019, Pages 1070-1088. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuron.2019.02.041 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0896627319302065

Guomei Tang et al. 2014. Loss of mTOR-Dependent Macroautophagy Causes Autistic-like Synaptic Pruning Deficits. Neuron: August 21, 2014. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuron.2014.07.040 https://www.cell.com/neuron/fulltext/S0896-6273(14)00651-5

(5) So how are synapses formed and regulated in the first place? When do neurons 'know' which synapses to prune and which synapses to keep? Back on tweet 3, I provided one article.
Another excellent resource is this neurodevelopmental anatomy textbook.
Building brains - An introduction to neural development
by David J. Price, Andrew P. Jarman, John O. Mason, Peter C. Kind
https://www.research.ed.ac.uk/en/publications/building-brains-an-introduction-to...

(6) But the answer is clear. Genes determine this. Genes direct the production of specific enzymes, proteins, receptors and transcription factors, which then influence how synapses form, where they travel to, and whether they will be pruned later or not.

(7) Synapses are present across the entire central nervous system.
ASD isn't just one part of the CNS operating differently - it's ALL of it.
Synapses are the 'roads' that messages take to reach specific areas of the brain. They carry a message that, eg, your pizza tastes of ham,

(8) or that your hand is on top of a hot stove, or that you're unbalanced on your right side.
ASD affects how we process information, how signals arrive at our brain and are interpreted, and synapses also explain the multitude of sensory issues commonly found in ASD.

(9) For example, I have issues with labels in clothes. Most people will forget about that label that's in their top, touching their skin, because they have an ordinary number of synapses. But when you have additional synapses, that message is 'fired' over and over again. Eek!

(10) The same applies to noise, light, visual disturbances, touch, taste, and smell. ASD isn't a part of us. It's HOW we ourselves interact with the world. It's our whole existance, because your CNS and brain defines your existance.
Now that we've covered the basics...

vaccines, aluminium...

Trisha Cis Greenhalgh @trishgreenhalgh | 2:56 PM · Jul 9, 2023:
Professor of Primary Health Care, Oxford.
https://twitter.com/trishgreenhalgh/status/1678115991283269635

Anti-vax movements cause a lot of harm. By ‘anti-vax’ I don’t mean anyone who raises concerns about harms or possible harms from vaccines. I mean people who *ignore scientific evidence* and perpetuate a distorted and entirely negative message about the benefit-harm balance. 🧵 1/

Vaccines against covid-19 greatly improve survival and reduce (though they do not eliminate) the risk of long-term complications like long covid and the risk of transmitting the disease to others. {there is much evidence here – example paper linked}
https://nature.com/articles/s41598-021-02321-z 2/

All vaccines occasionally cause harm. But the harms are a) rare, b) usually mild, and c) less bad (in terms of prevalence and severity) than untreated covid-19. There’s a debate to be had about the nuances but OVERALL being vaccinated is far safer than staying unvaccinated. 3/

Vaccine hesitancy is common. In one study, 28% of people were either strongly opposed to, or very unsure about, covid vaccination. A major determinant of hesitancy was “excessive mistrust”, including “conspiracy beliefs” and “negative views of doctors”.
https://cambridge.org/core/journals/psychological-medicine/article/covid19-vacci...
4/

A 2022 systematic review of the underlying causes of vaccine hesitancy around the world identified inter-related influences including “safety {concerns}”, “conspiracy beliefs”, “trust”, “fear and anxiety” and “social influence”.
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0265496
5/

Another systematic review showed that while most people’s vaccine decisions aren't influenced by conspiracy theories, those theories have a significant influence at population level, lowering the overall vaccination rate and jeopardising public health.
https://sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352250X22000653
6/

Social media has a huge effect on vaccine hesitancy. Here’s one of many studies which have shown that the development of vaccine hesitancy was linked to “following, sharing, and interacting with low-quality information online”.
https://academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/article/1/4/pgac207/6726650?login=false
7/

Another wide-ranging review found that vaccine hesitancy was associated with negative risk perceptions, low trust in health care systems, solidarity with others sharing the same views, misinformation, concerns about side effects and political ideology.
https://ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9278223/
8/

Anti-vax conspiracy theories in USA are strongly linked to the anti-intellectualist, anti-authoritarian far-right, and aligned with right-wing news channels and organised political protest (including the January 6th insurrection).
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/837802/pdf
9/

People who join anti-vax movements are less educated, more likely to mistrust authority and less likely to believe in scientific facts or value scientific institutions, and more likely to hold libertarian views than those who don’t.
https://sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277953621002628
10/

Overall, doctors and other health professionals view covid-19 vaccines as highly beneficial, even taking into account rare harms, though they vary on how strongly and in what circumstances they’d recommend vaccination.
https://mdpi.com/2076-393X/10/6/948
11/

Some health professionals believe vaccines are overall harmful, and a tiny fraction have openly espoused conspiracy theories—e.g. that vaccine manufacturers wish people to be harmed.
https://mdpi.com/2076-393X/9/12/1428
12/

Many factors influence the spread of vaccine misinformation on social media. One is its source. Whilst few studies have looked explicitly at this question, there is some evidence that *information from a health professional spreads faster and farther*.
https://publichealth.jmir.org/2023/1/e40201#ref79
13/

It is troubling, then, that the emergence of anti-vax conspiracy movements has been associated with “the rise and economic success of alternative medical celebrities as conspiracy entrepreneurs”.
https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/handle/20.500.12657/61142/9781000846294.pdf?...
14/

“MEDICAL CELEBRITIES AS CONSPIRACY ENTREPRENEURS” means doctors who use their medical qualification to bolster anti-vax narratives among people who are already vaccine-hesitant. This whips up mistrust (of vaccines and of medical science generally).
15/

Medical CONSPIRACY ENTREPRENEURS, says this paper, “tap into deep-seated fears, concerns, anxieties, and perceived injustices that preoccupy people especially in times of a global crisis”.
16/

In pre-Internet days, the worst a doctor could do was harm their own patients one at a time. But if a doctor achieves a prominent position on social media and puts out anti-vax messages to *hundreds of thousands of followers* who forward them on, *far more harm* could result.
17/

Some doctors have complained to the General Medical Council about their colleagues' anti-vax behaviour on social media. But GMC isn’t interested. It doesn’t like doctors mis-advising individual patients, but it doesn’t mind them telling the whole world not to get vaccinated!
18/

In refusing to open investigations into doctors who are credibly accused of widespread dissemination of false and misleading information about vaccines on social media, the GMC has positioned itself as an ANALOG REGULATOR IN A DIGITAL WORLD.
19/

I have argued in this thread about the difference between genuine scientific debate about the pros and cons of vaccines and the kind of ‘conspiracy entrepreneur’ behaviour described above.
https://twitter.com/trishgreenhalgh/status/1676929580290981888?s=20
20/

TRG has left the building @TRyanGregory | 10:22 PM · Jul 10, 2023:
...Exposure to *commensal microbes* is important for early immune system development in young children. Infection with *pathogenic viruses* in infancy can disrupt that and lead to long-term morbidity.

Text
https://twitter.com/TRyanGregory/status/1678590652693577728/photo/1
https://twitter.com/TRyanGregory/status/1678590652693577728/photo/2
https://twitter.com/TRyanGregory/status/1678590652693577728/photo/3
https://twitter.com/TRyanGregory/status/1678590652693577728/photo/4
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Clare M. Lloyd & Sejal Saglani 2023. Early-life respiratory infections and developmental immunity determine lifelong lung health (Review). Nature Immunology (6 July 2023) https://www.nature.com/articles/s41590-023-01550-w

Abstract

Respiratory infections are common in infants and young children. However, the immune system develops and matures as the child grows, thus the effects of infection during this time of dynamic change may have long-term consequences. The infant immune system develops in conjunction with the seeding of the microbiome at the respiratory mucosal surface, at a time that the lungs themselves are maturing. We are now recognizing that any disturbance of this developmental trajectory can have implications for lifelong lung health. Here, we outline our current understanding of the molecular mechanisms underlying relationships between immune and structural cells in the lung with the local microorganisms. We highlight the importance of gaining greater clarity as to what constitutes a healthy respiratory ecosystem and how environmental exposures influencing this network will aid efforts to mitigate harmful effects and restore lung immune health.

Distracting an infant vaxxee: :)
0:32 ( https://twitter.com/Figensport/status/1679174327374168080 )

Florian Krammer 2023. The role of vaccines in the COVID-19 pandemic: what have we learned? (Review) Seminars in Immunopathology (12 July 2023). https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00281-023-00996-2

...Summary and outlook
We have learned a lot during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. Countermeasures were developed in record time, vaccine technologies were tested side-by-side, and novel technologies were rolled out at large scale for the first time. From a technology point of view, we responded quickly—even though a quicker response is, and would have been possible... Looking forward into the future, we could be well prepared for new pandemics. Sequencing technologies and high-throughout serology allow for effective surveillance in animal and human populations. Virology laboratories are set up well to connect genotypes with concerning pathogen phenotypes to allow for establishment of early warning systems. We have all the tools necessary to understand correlates of protection if needed and vaccine technologies for quick employment in the case of a new pandemic have been developed and are available. In summary, we understand the key issues that need to be addressed for pandemic preparedness from a scientific and technological point of view. Nevertheless, the outlook into the future is a negative one. Just about 3 years after the emergence of SARS-CoV-2, it seems politicians and governments have forgotten that the pandemic existed and very little is spent—e.g., in comparison to defense—on pandemic preparedness. This is despite the fact that enormous amounts of money were lost during the pandemic... and despite the fact that spending on pandemic preparedness could certainly be seen as defense spending. In addition, beliefs in conspiracy theories, denial, and anti-vax sentiments have spread far and wide, and may make it difficult to get “buy in” from the population once the next pandemic occurs. Unfortunately, this will likely be sooner than later. Several factors including a larger human animal interface (due to a growing population and therefore a growing number of domestic animals), ecosystem destruction, climate change, and others will likely lead to a higher frequency of outbreaks compared to the past. We have learned a lot from the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. As a society, we now need to start to take viruses seriously and implement what we learned.

Clare M. Lloyd & Sejal Saglani 2023. Early-life respiratory infections and developmental immunity determine lifelong lung health (Review). Nature Immunology (6 July 2023) https://www.nature.com/articles/s41590-023-01550-w

Abstract
Respiratory infections are common in infants and young children. However, the immune system develops and matures as the child grows, thus the effects of infection during this time of dynamic change may have long-term consequences. The infant immune system develops in conjunction with the seeding of the microbiome at the respiratory mucosal surface, at a time that the lungs themselves are maturing. We are now recognizing that any disturbance of this developmental trajectory can have implications for lifelong lung health. Here, we outline our current understanding of the molecular mechanisms underlying relationships between immune and structural cells in the lung with the local microorganisms. We highlight the importance of gaining greater clarity as to what constitutes a healthy respiratory ecosystem and how environmental exposures influencing this network will aid efforts to mitigate harmful effects and restore lung immune health.
----------------------------------------------------------------

T. Ryan Gregory @TRyanGregory | 10:22 AM · Jul 23, 2023:
{evolutionary biologist, U Guelph}

Exposure to *commensal microbes* is important for early immune system development in young children.

Infection with *pathogenic viruses* in infancy can disrupt that and lead to long-term morbidity.

{graph lung function https://twitter.com/TRyanGregory/status/1683120422450069507 }

Yes, there are cases of Amish children with autism, cancer and diabetes | Fact check
BrieAnna J Frank | 24 July 2023

The claim: A new study found zero cases of autism, cancer or diabetes in Amish children...

Our rating: False
The Amish Heritage Foundation told USA TODAY there are cases of Amish children with each of the listed conditions. A researcher who focuses on the Amish community highlighted news articles and studies showing Amish children are not exempt from cancer, autism or diabetes....

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2023/07/24/false-claim-no-amish-ki...

Measles was once seen as a childhood disease. Increasingly, adults are susceptible, too
Helen Branswell | Aug. 2, 2023

...The infection was once a rarity in adults. But the reality of measles as a disease that strikes almost uniquely in childhood is changing. The shift is driven in part by the fact that the first wave of children whose parents shunned vaccination in the late 1990s and early 2000s — in response to a fallacious, since-retracted study in the Lancet that linked measles vaccine to autism — are now in young adulthood...iology — could fuel future measles outbreaks.

https://www.statnews.com/2023/08/02/adult-measles-infection/
-------------------------------------------

UK Health Security Agency 2023. Risk assessment for measles resurgence in the UK. 17 p. https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attac...

The Irish Light: Woman abused by paper which falsely said vaccine killed her son (BBC)

A grieving mother and her lawyer have been targeted by an extreme campaign of abuse after suing a conspiracy theory newspaper which falsely claimed her son died from a Covid vaccine. The Irish Light repeatedly abused Edel Campbell online and its supporters have threatened her lawyer with "execution". Conspiracy theorists worldwide have used dozens of tragic deaths to spread vaccine misinformation. This case is thought to be the first where a relative has sued. The Irish Light included Ms Campbell's son, Diego Gilsenan, and 41 others in an article last year which suggested the "untested and dangerous" Covid vaccine was to blame for the deaths. In fact, the BBC has been told Diego had taken his own life in August 2021, aged 18, and had not been vaccinated...

>61 margd:
How States Can Better Regulate Indoor Air Quality
Aleyna Rentz, Aliza Rosen | August 18, 2023

We spend most of our lives indoors, so how can we ensure the air we breathe there is as safe as possible? A new model law* could help.

https://publichealth.jhu.edu/2023/regulating-indoor-air-quality
----------------------------------------------------

* Model State Indoor Air Quality Act
https://centerforhealthsecurity.org/our-work/research-projects/indoor-air-qualit...

Smart people first in line for COVID-19 vaccines, study suggests
Mary Van Beusekom | September 8, 2023
https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/covid-19/smart-people-first-line-covid-19-vaccines-st...
------------------------------------------

Mikael Elinder et al 2023. Cognitive ability, health policy, and the dynamics of COVID-19 vaccination. Journal of Health Economics Volume 91, September 2023. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhealeco.2023.102802 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167629623000796

Abstract
We examine the relationship between cognitive ability and prompt COVID-19 vaccination using individual-level data on more than 700,000 individuals in Sweden. We find a strong positive association between cognitive ability and swift vaccination, which remains even after controlling for confounding variables with a twin-design. The results suggest that the complexity of the vaccination decision may make it difficult for individuals with lower cognitive abilities to understand the benefits of vaccination. Consistent with this, we show that simplifying the vaccination decision through pre-booked vaccination appointments alleviates almost all of the inequality in vaccination behavior.

Removing vaccine misinformation from Facebook during the #COVID19 pandemic did not decrease overall engagement with anti-vaccine content on the platform
Motivated users may still seek out misinformation
Facebook’s architecture allows them to find it

David A. Broniatowski et al. 2023. The efficacy of Facebook’s vaccine misinformation policies and architecture during the COVID-19 pandemic. Science Advances 15 Sep 2023 Vol 9, Issue 37 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.adh2132 https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adh2132

Abstract
Online misinformation promotes distrust in science, undermines public health, and may drive civil unrest. During the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic, Facebook—the world’s largest social media company—began to remove vaccine misinformation as a matter of policy. We evaluated the efficacy of these policies using a comparative interrupted time-series design. We found that Facebook removed some antivaccine content, but we did not observe decreases in overall engagement with antivaccine content. Provaccine content was also removed, and antivaccine content became more misinformative, more politically polarized, and more likely to be seen in users’ newsfeeds. We explain these findings as a consequence of Facebook’s system architecture, which provides substantial flexibility to motivated users who wish to disseminate misinformation through multiple channels. Facebook’s architecture may therefore afford antivaccine content producers several means to circumvent the intent of misinformation removal policies.

Fig. 2. Changes in antivaccine topic proportions relative to prepolicy and provaccine trends.

World Health Organization (WHO) WHO | 1:18 PM · Sep 22, 2023:

WHO has officially launched the Tuberculosis Vaccine Accelerator Council.

The Council aims to identify 👇
🔵 innovative sustainable financing,
🔵market solutions &
🔵partnerships across public, private, & philanthropic sectors to facilitate the development, licensing & use of new TB vaccines.

Did you know?
Bacille Calmette-Guerin (BCG) is currently the only licensed vaccine for tuberculosis. { more than a hundred years old }

bit.ly/EndTBCommitments

0:54 ( https://twitter.com/WHO/status/1705270403453595991 )

Diphtheria outbreak spreads across 105 LGAs {Local Government Areas, Nigeria}, kills 453 children ...
Chioma Obinna | 25 Sept 2023

...the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, NCDC, and National Primary Health Care Development Agency, NPHCDA, explained that 5,299 (73.6 per cent)) of the confirmed cases occurred among children aged 1 – 14 years with those aged 5-14 years bearing most of the brunt of the disease.

The Agencies in the joint statement, explained that as of September 24th, 2023, there have been 11,587 reported suspected cases out of which 7,202 were confirmed cases from 105 Local Government Areas, LGAs, in 18 States including the FCT {Federal Capital Area}.

They noted that a total of 6,185 of the confirmed cases were recorded in Kano while other States with cases include; Yobe (640), Katsina (213), Borno (95), Kaduna (16), Jigawa (14), Bauchi (8), Lagos (8), FCT (5), Gombe (5), Osun (3), Sokoto (3), Niger (2), Cross River (1), Enugu (1), Imo (1), Nasarawa (1) and Zamfara (1). The majority (5,299 (73.6%)) of the confirmed cases occurred among children aged 1 – 14 years with those aged 5-14 years bearing most of the brunt of the disease.

“So far, a total of 453 deaths have occurred in confirmed cases giving a case fatality rate (CFR) of 6.3 per cent,” they noted.

...80 per cent of confirmed cases in the ongoing outbreak were unvaccinated...A historical gap in vaccination coverage was the driver of the outbreak...only 42 per cent of children under 15 years old are fully protected from diphtheria...{vaccines provided routinely through Nigeria’s childhood immunisation schedule}...

https://www.vanguardngr.com/2023/09/diphtheria-outbreak-spreads-across-105-lgas-...

Promising malaria vaccine clears clinical hurdle, could get WHO endorsement next week
The new shots could make malaria protection more plentiful and affordable
Gretchen Vogel | 29 Sept 2023

https://www.science.org/content/article/promising-malaria-vaccine-passes-final-c...
-------------------------------------------------
ETA:

Second malaria vaccine to win global approval is cheaper and easier to make
The World Health Organization has recommended a shot called R21 to prevent the disease in children.
Miryam Naddaf | 03 October 2023
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-03115-1

My comments ⁦@USATODAY with ⁦@mikefreemanNFL on high profile athletes who promote antivaccine disinformation, and why this hurts the franchise, the league, the sport, and the nation

https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/columnist/mike-freeman/2023/10/06/aaron-ro...

- Prof Peter Hotez MD PhD @PeterHotez | 8:11 AM · Oct 6, 2023:
Vaccine Scientist-Author-Combat Antiscience @bcmhouston, Professor Pediatrics Molecular Virology, @bcm_tropmed
Dean, TexasChildrens Chair in Tropical Pediatrics

Prof Jeffrey S Morris @jsm2334 | 7:27 AM · Oct 6, 2023:
George S. Pepper Professor of Public Health & Preventive Medicine; Biostats, Stats & Data Science, UPenn

Well done YouTube explanation on why the shape of the Vaers death curve is what is expected by chance based on background death rate and reporting patterns and not indicative of substantial vaccine deaths
-----------------------------------------------

VAERS mRNA Death Curve Explained Clearly (40:37)
MedCram - Medical Lectures Explained CLEARLY
Oct 3, 2023

Dr. Seheult of MedCram clearly explains the VAERS reported death curve for the mRNA vaccines in 2021. What is the reason for its appearance and what conclusions, if any can we draw from it?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mU45dh1bws

Mask mandates are returning to some hospitals. Should they be there to stay?
Some doctors are calling for more preventative measures to protect vulnerable patients in medical settings
Elizabeth Hlavinka | 5 Oct 2023

...doctors are urging hospitals to put safety first. Research shows that when community COVID-19 transmission increases, it translates to an outsized COVID-19 spread in hospitals. One study of hospitals in England and Scotland found COVID-19 cases that originated in the hospital jumped 41% after they stopped universal testing upon admission. Another study in JAMA Oncology found more patients with cancer died from COVID during the winter Omicron wave than prior waves, which the authors linked partially to "the relaxation of policies to prevent SARS-CoV-2 transmission."

Many healthcare providers on the frontlines warn that loosening protective measures in hospitals can increase infections from not just COVID-19 but also flu and other viruses. In one study within Brigham and Women's Hospital, COVID-19 protocols cut the spread of the season's other two major viruses, flu and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), by 50%. Another study published today found pandemic protocols at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center reduced respiratory viral infections among vulnerable patients...

https://www.salon.com/2023/10/05/mask-mandates-are-returning-to-some-hospitals-s...

>78 margd: Not a football fan really but Aaron Rodger's disingenuous remarks a couple years ago after a reporter asked him if he was vaccinated shows what an asshole he has become. He deliberately misled people and the NFL into thinking he had been vaccinated--did not abide by league or employer covid safety precautions and then later on when called out he went the victim route. He got away with all that because in football circles he is one of those who is too big to hold to real account or kind of like most republicans these days look at Donald Trump. Rodger's also is another of the both sides things of the political trying to make himself out to be reasonable saying he's a liberal while he flirts with right wing and conspiratorial ideology.

Polio eradication
Effort to permanently eliminate all cases of poliomyelitis infection

Polio eradication, the permanent global cessation of circulation of the poliovirus and hence elimination of the poliomyelitis it causes, is the aim of a multinational public health effort begun in 1988, led by the World Health Organization, the United Nations Children's Fund and the Rotary Foundation. (Wikipedia)
-----------------------------------------

Polio cases reported in Afghanistan, Chad, and DR Congo (News brief)
Chris Dall | October 6, 2023
https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/polio/polio-cases-reported-afghanistan-chad-and-dr-co...

Prof Peter Hotez MD PhD @PeterHotez | 8:38 PM · Oct 27, 2023:
Vaccine Scientist-Author-Combat Antiscience @bcmhouston. Professor Pediatrics Molecular Virology, @bcm_tropmed . Dean, TexasChildrens Chair in Tropical Pediatrics

The reality: 40,000 people needlessly perished in my state of Texas, 200,000 Americans died, bc they refused Covid vaccines in our awful delta/BA.1 waves 2021-22 when vaccines were more than 90% protective vs severe illness/death. They were victims of a targeted disinformation campaign.

Vincenzo Carrieri et al. 2023. Trust and COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy. NATURE Scientific Reports volume 13, Article number: 9245 (7 June 2023) Open access. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-023-35974-z

Abstract
This article uses novel data collected on a weekly basis covering more than 35,000 individuals in the EU to analyze the relationship between trust in various dimensions and COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy. We found that trust in science is negatively correlated, while trust in social media and the use of social media as the main source of information are positively associated with vaccine hesitancy. High trust in social media is found among adults aged 65+, financially distressed and unemployed individuals, and hesitancy is largely explained by conspiracy beliefs among them. Finally, we found that the temporary suspension of the AstraZeneca vaccine in March 2021 significantly increased vaccine hesitancy and especially among people with low trust in science, living in rural areas, females, and financially distressed. Our findings suggest that trust is a key determinant of vaccine hesitancy and that pro-vaccine campaigns could be successfully targeted toward groups at high risk of hesitancy.

Global fight against HIV is at risk (editorial)
Wafaa M. El-Sadr and Myron S. Cohen
Science | 2 Nov 2023

Will the United States remain committed to a landmark health program it started 20 years ago that saved more than 25 million lives around the world? For a younger generation of physicians, nurses, and researchers today, the depth of despair wrought by the HIV/AIDS epidemic at that time is almost unimaginable. Even more profoundly, for countries in Africa, the epidemic presented an existential threat. Without access to antiretroviral therapy or efficacious prevention tools, new infections continued unfettered, and people with HIV/AIDS faced near-certain death. Yet, somehow out of this anguish, came a ray of hope. In 2003, President George W. Bush announced the launch of the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), committing billions of dollars to fight the epidemic in the poorest countries around the world. The initiative has been a shining example of global collaboration in the face of adversity. Yet, as of this September, the US Congress has yet to reauthorize PEPFAR. The Biden administration, individuals from both sides of the political divide, and former President Bush himself have urged Congress to support PEPFAR’s lifesaving work. The scientific and public health communities must do the same before it is too late...

DOI: 10.1126/science.adm6975
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adm6975

Vaccine Confidence Falls as Belief in Health Misinformation Grows
Annenberg Public Policy Center, U PA | November 1, 2023

...Beliefs in vaccine misinformation are on the rise:
Vaccinations affecting childhood autism: There’s been a decline in the number of people who know it is false to say that “increased vaccinations are why so many kids have autism these days,” dropping to 65% from 71% in April 2021. The number of people who believe that this is true has grown to 16% from 10% over that period. ...

Growing belief in false MMR-autism link: Asked if it is true or false that vaccines given to children for diseases like measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) cause autism, 12% incorrectly say this is true, up from 9% in June 2021, a statistically significant rise. Most people (70%) correctly say that this allegation is false. ...

Flu shot and Covid-19: There was a small but statistically significant increase in the number of people who incorrectly think that getting a flu shot increases your risk of contracting Covid-19 – 9% say this is true, up from 6% in January 2023. ...

Growing belief that vaccines contain toxins: More than 1 in 10 people (12%) now incorrectly believe it is true that “vaccines in general are full of toxins and harmful ingredients like ‘antifreeze,’” a significant increase from 8% in April 2021. Although most people (73%) know this is false, that number has declined from 77% in June 2021...

Ivermectin to treat Covid-19: Over a quarter (26%) incorrectly say ivermectin is an effective treatment for Covid-19, up from 10% in September 2021. The percentage who know this is false also rose, to 37% from 27% in September 2021. Overall, the number of people who are unsure declined, to 38% from 63%...

Cancer and mRNA vaccines: 12% of those surveyed say it is true that mRNA vaccines against Covid-19 “cause cancer,” up from 9% in January 2023. The number who believe this is false remained steady at 58%. ...

In addition, many do not know that the flu vaccine cannot give you the flu: Just half of those surveyed (51%) know that the seasonal flu shot distributed in the U.S. cannot give you flu, while nearly 3 in 10 people (29%) think that is false. This finding is statistically unchanged since January. ...

https://www.annenbergpublicpolicycenter.org/vaccine-confidence-falls-as-belief-i...

Dr Satoshi Akima FRACP 『秋間聰』@ToshiAkima | 6:45 AM · Nov 4, 2023:
Nephrology & Internal Medicine. Immunothrombosis incl DIC {Disseminated intravascular coagulation is a condition in which blood clots form throughout the body, blocking small blood vessels.}. @ISTH (The International Society on Thrombosis & Haemostasis) Member.

The Central Error of the Pandemic…
Is that of running pandemic management by laissez-faire socioeconomic principles.
If you grasp this, all the other errors fall into place as the inevitable consequence of following that line of thought. 🧵 1/x

Economics is the final bastion of Social Darwinism. Its laissez-faire principles dictate that all Keynesian central government-instituted intervention, even in a crisis, only makes things worse. A crisis should be allowed to run its natural course.

A crisis is a welcome process of cleansing out of the unfit, resulting in economic renewal through creative destruction. It is often likened to a forest fire. The charred remains of the fire fertilises renewal.

When the weak, economically unviable units are cleansed out while the strong survive, it is deemed progress. It is an unnatural perversion to intervene in the order of Nature, as it perpetuates the sustenance of unfit and unhealthy “zombie” units.

If the vulnerable die from wilfully spreading SARS-CoV-2, that is just an unavoidable historical necessity, the price one pays for progress. The end justifies the means—for the alternatives could only be worse.

The demagogues of laissez-faire had meanwhile devised their own plan: the herd immunity strategy. This involved using SARS-CoV-2 as nature’s gift of a vaccine against itself (there is historical precedent with smallpox variolation).

Once enough of the population had been mass infected, the pandemic would end from herd immunity. The sooner everyone was mass infected, the sooner the pandemic would end.

Central government intervention to slow the spread would be harmful because it would merely “kick the can down the road” and prolong the pandemic.

It was thus necessary to promote rapid SARS-CoV-2 mass “variolation” as a safe and “natural” form of vaccination with “mild” side effects. Thus, СОVID minimisation was born.

All harm arising from SARS-CoV-2 is next blamed on the mRNA vaccine because it is a centrally funded government intervention, which can, therefore, only be harmful because it violates the economic principles of naturalistic laissez-faire.

The “anti-vaxx” movement is just a consequence of this. But there is no keener pro-vaxxer than an anti-vaxxer wanting to “naturally” mass vaccinate everyone. During the SARS1 epidemic, we received instructions to wear N95 respirators during PPE {Personal Protective Equipment} training. The 2013 Fauci edited Harrison’s Principles of Internal Medicine stated both influenza and SARS were airborne diseases.

Come 2019, there was precedent for deploying RPE {respiratory protective equipment} as an NPI {non-pharmaceutical intervention} against SARS, just as we had successfully deployed condoms against HIV. The problem is that it pointed towards a path of central government Keynesian intervention using public health measures to quell the looming threat.

The very existence of a pathway that would radically slow or stop the spread of disease was an offence to the demagogues of laissez-faire. NPIs, like RPE, were thus an unnatural perversion that would cause more harm than good.

It was thus not acceptable that #COVIDisAirborne. Everything had to be done to oppose any evidence that might hinder the mass variolation of the population with SARS-CoV-2 to bring the pandemic to a radical conclusion.

To argue for the herd immunity strategy, they effectively claimed that as there were no RCTs (“gold standard” {randomized controlled trial}) to show the moon was made of mineral, it must be made of cheese. I.e. there were no RCTs showing that NPIs worked, therefore, SARS2 mass infection is safe and effective.

The scientific errors committed during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic can readily be understood as having occurred on the basis of socioeconomic and political interference in the scientific process. Similar forces in the nineteenth century colluded to interfere with the acceptance of cholera as a waterborne contagious infectious disease with the opposition from laissez-faire groups to germ theory. Germ theory favoured the contagionist position that central government interference was necessary to stop disease spread between subjects. But the nineteenth century was the age of empire and industrial revolution, which encouraged strong government initiative with a more optimistic view of the ability of science to transform society for the better. That is why the 19th C did better in conquering cholera than we have done in conquering SARS-CoV-2.

Death in Hamburg by Richard Evans . A book written in 1987 for our COVID age. The title, a reference to Thomas Mann's Death in Venice, this is a review of one of the best books I've ever read. 5/5 stars. 🧵
__________________________________________

Oldlongdog 🐟 @AllianceNowUk 🇪🇺🇬🇧 @oldlongdog | 8:07 AM · Nov 3, 2023:

Shocking revelation @ #CovidInquiryUK. Then head of Public Health England Yvonne Doyle tells how she was silenced by an angry Matt Hancock {Secretary of State} in early Feb 2020 after stating facts about Covid to the Press...

#ToriesUnfitToGovern
1:45 ( https://twitter.com/oldlongdog/status/1720412266099536226 )

A cousin suffered from debilitating Chikungunya for a year+ after a Caribbean holiday. She's fine now, but couldn't even dress herself for a while there...

FDA approves first vaccine against chikungunya virus for people over 18
Vanessa Arredondo | 9 Nov 2023

...The vaccine, Ixchiq, was approved for people 18 years and older who are at an increased risk of exposure to the virus, in what officials said is an emerging global health threat, with at least 5 million cases reported during the past 15 years.

...the highest risk of infection is in the tropical and subtropical regions of Africa, Southeast Asia, and parts of the Americas, where the virus-carrying mosquitoes are endemic. But chikungunya virus has spread elsewhere, causing more cases of the disease globally

..."Infection with chikungunya virus can lead to severe disease and prolonged health problems, particularly for older adults and individuals with underlying medical conditions," said Dr. Peter Marks, director of the FDA's Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research.

The most common symptoms of chikungunya are fever and debilitating joint pain, which may persist for months or years...Other symptoms include rash, headache, and muscle pain...chikungunya virus is also severe and potentially fatal to newborn babies from pregnant individuals at delivery...

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2023/11/09/chikungunya-virus-vaccine-...

Chise 🧬🧫🦠🔬💉🥼🥽 @sailorrooscout | 11:08 AM · Dec 14, 2023:
Senior Scientist | Vaccine Research & Development | NIH | NIAID | VRC |

...this is REALLY exciting news. Midstage trial results show Moderna’s cancer vaccine mRNA-4157 in combination with Merck’s KEYTRUDA reduced the risk of death or relapse in patients with melanoma by HALF after roughly THREE years! Let’s talk about that! 🧵

https://twitter.com/sailorrooscout/status/1735330834301784350
----------------------------------------------

You can read all this and more here:

•https://cnbc.com/2023/12/14/moderna-merck-cancer-vaccine-reduces-risk-of-skin-cancer-return.html
"On Monday, the drugmakers started a late-stage trial on the combination as a treatment for non-small cell lung cancer."

•https://investors.modernatx.com/news/news-details/2023/Moderna-And-Merck-Announce-mRNA-4157-V940-In-Combination-with-KeytrudaR-Pembrolizumab-Demonstrated-Continued-Improvement-in-Recurrence-Free-Survival-and-Distant-Metastasis-Free-Survival-in-Patients-with-High-Risk-Stage-IIIIV-Melanoma-Following-Comple/default.aspx

•https://news.yahoo.com/benefits-moder

Bubble timeline of diseases and vaccine introductions:

Here's the visual proof of why vaccines do more good than harm
See year by year how vaccines beat back nine dangerous infectious diseases
Jia You | 27 Apr 2017

doi: 10.1126/science.aal1107
https://www.science.org/content/article/here-s-visual-proof-why-vaccines-do-more...

Vaccine 'Promising' for Delaying Relapse in KRAS-Mutated Pancreatic Cancer, CRC
— T-cell response linked to 86% reduced risk of relapse, death
Mike Bassett | January 9, 2024

An investigational therapeutic vaccine appeared to be effective in delaying relapse of KRAS-mutated pancreatic and colorectal cancer (CRC), according to results from the phase I AMPLIFY-201 study...

...ELI-002 is composed of AMP-modified mutant KRAS* peptide antigens and ELI-004 -- an AMP-modified immune-stimulatory oligonucleotide CpG adjuvant available as an off-the-shelf subcutaneous administration. (Shubham Pant, MD, MBBS, of the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston) explained that what distinguishes ELI-oo2 as a vaccine is that it is directed into lymph nodes in order to elicit more robust immune responses and target mutant KRAS with greater potency and precision.

...Pant noted that a potential advantage of ELI-002 is its availability as an off-the-shelf therapy.

"Recently, individualized neoantigen cancer vaccines have shown promising efficacy for PDAC, non-small cell lung cancer, colorectal cancer, and melanoma," the authors wrote. "The availability of ELI-002 as an 'off-the-shelf' product offers several further advantages, including streamlined standard manufacturing to facilitate on-demand availability while eliminating the need for tumor-informed production, which presents operational risks and limits use to post-surgical adjuvant stage."

Results from this trial have led to a phase II trial opens in a new tab or windowthat will begin later this year, Pant noted, with a new formulation of ELI-002 that will target seven of the most common KRAS mutations.

https://www.medpagetoday.com/hematologyoncology/othercancers/108183
---------------------------------------------------

Shubham Pant et al. 2024. Lymph-node-targeted, mKRAS-specific amphiphile vaccine in pancreatic and colorectal cancer: the phase 1 AMPLIFY-201 trial. Nature Medicine (9 Jan 2024) Open access. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-023-02760-3

Abstract
* Pancreatic and colorectal cancers are often KRAS mutated and are incurable when tumor DNA or protein persists or recurs after curative intent therapy. Cancer vaccine ELI-002 2P enhances lymph node delivery and immune response...
_______________________________________

* KRAS is a gene that provides instructions for making a protein called K-Ras, a part of the RAS/MAPK pathway. The protein relays signals from outside the cell to the cell's nucleus. These signals instruct the cell to grow and divide or to mature and take on specialized functions. It is called KRAS because it was first identified as a viral oncogene in the Kirsten RAt Sarcoma virus. (Wikipedia)

Florida's GOP Governor DeSantis is running for POTUS this year.

Yet DeSantis' state's solution to exorbent prescription drug prices is... trying to buy the medicines wholesale from the "socialist" country on the other side of the continent?

"Florida's plan to import cheaper drugs from Canada faces pushback — from Canada:
People in Florida could wait years for lower-cost medications, if they get them at all, experts say."
https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/canada-outrage-florida-cheaper-prescr...

The saddest part about this to me is that middle-class Floridians go to both Canada and Mexico for medicines. I've been given health stuff from Asia and known Americans who enlist help from European friends in buying drugs and medical machines. A large part of the tourism from the USA is for medical supplies and services.

Republicans in a country with our wealth and a state the size of Florida (with more than 20 million people) choose to rely on better healthcare options in other countries instead of improve the manufacturing and distribution within our own horrific healthcare systems.

Jean Kaseya @JeanKaseya2 | Last edited 6:24 AM · Jan 22, 2024
Director General @AfricaCDC Ethiopia

Today marks a historic milestone in public health.
RTS,S malaria vaccine is finally introduced after 30+ years of development.
Cameroon is the first in Africa to roll out this vaccine.

I encourage @_AfricanUnion Member States to join Cameroon in rolling out this vaccine.

Photo ( https://twitter.com/JeanKaseya2/status/1749392514543468912/photo/1 )
African Union and Africa CDC

Scotland:

Tim J Palmer et al. 2024. Invasive cervical cancer incidence following bivalent human papillomavirus vaccination: a population-based observational study of age at immunization, dose, and deprivation. JNCI: Journal of the National Cancer Institute, djad263, Published: 22 January 2024. https://doi.org/10.1093/jnci/djad263 https://academic.oup.com/jnci/advance-article-abstract/doi/10.1093/jnci/djad263/...

Corrected Proof.

ABSTRACT
...Conclusion. Our findings confirm that the bivalent vaccine prevents the development of invasive cervical cancer and that even 1 or 2 doses 1 month apart confer benefit if given at 12-13 years of age. At older ages, 3 doses are required for statistically significant vaccine effectiveness. Women from more deprived areas benefit more from vaccination than those from less deprived areas.
-----------------------------------------------------

Meanwhile in the US:
Since the mid-1970s, cervical cancer rates have decreased by more than half due to improved access to screening and treatment of precursor lesions. However, a new study published in the CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians suggests that cervical cancer is increasing again.

https://healthnews.com/news/hpv-related-cervical-cancer-is-on-the-rise/
https://acsjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.3322/caac.21820

WHO issues measles warning as yearly cases in Europe rise more than 30-fold (Guardian)

The World Health Organization has issued an urgent warning over measles after an “alarming” 30-fold rise in cases across Europe... The warning came just days after the UK declared a national incident amid a surge in cases, and launched a campaign to encourage parents to get the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine for their children... “Vaccination is the only way to protect children from this potentially dangerous disease. Urgent vaccination efforts are needed to halt transmission and prevent further spread”...

>92 aspirit: There is no way that Canada with 1/10th the population of the US can supply American demand for prescription meds. Made me wonder if FL ploy, especially if DeSantis was elected president, is meant to undermine North American example of sane, negotiated pricing scheme.

Like Facebook, tolerating (Australian?) strategy to protect its news media from FB's poaching, came down on similar scheme in Canada--not allowing links to news stories, and blaming FB move on Cdn government?

p.s. I was able to buy an Epi-pen in Ontario--without an Rx--for $109 Cdn (~ $100 US) when it cost $600 in US, Rx required.

CORBEVAX COVID-19 vaccine secures WHO EUL approval
Charlotte Kilpatrick | Jan 24, 2024

In January 2024, Texas Children’s Hospital shared that CORBEVAX, developed and commercialised by Biological E, has been granted WHO approval under Emergency Use Listing (EUL). The recombinant, protein-based COVID-19 vaccine uses Pichia pastoris yeast strain expressed by Receptor Binding Domain (RBD) protein of SARS-CoV-2 engineered by teams at the Hospital’s Centre for Vaccine Development (CVD) and Baylor College of Medicine (BCM).

WHO states that EUL is a “risk-based” procedure to assess and list unlicensed interventions with the aim of “expediting the availability of these products to people affected by a public health emergency”. The procedure uses international standard to evaluate the standard of vaccine quality, safety, and effectiveness in this context.

Non-exclusive licensing
Mark A. Wallace, CEO of Texas Children’s Hospital, reflected that this approval is a “testament” to the Hospital’s “established methodology to express important antigenic proteins, which will help in the worldwide fight against COVID-19″...

https://vaccinenation.org/technology/corbevax-covid-19-vaccine-secures-who-eul-a...

India on the verge of eliminating 'black fever' kala-azar
Shakeel Sobhan | January 30, 2024

...Kala-azar — also known as visceral leishmaniasis — is a severe form of the vector-borne disease leishmaniasis caused by protozoan parasites that are transmitted by the bite of infected female sandflies...the second deadliest parasitic disease after malaria, affecting 200 million people in 76 countries.

The disease is characterized by symptoms like anemia, fever, weight loss, and enlargement of the liver and spleen. There is a treatment, but kala-azar is invariably fatal if the treatment is not administered in time...insecticidal spraying — a technique used to eradicate the sandfly vector...

India, Bangladesh and Nepal were considered hot spots of the disease in the South Asian region. ...In 2023, Bangladesh announced the elimination of kala-azar...the number of {Indian} cases dropp{ed} to 520 last year {2023}...

One main reason for the prevalence of kala-azar is the delay in detection. The disease starts as a mild, slowly progressing condition...

https://www.dw.com/en/india-on-the-verge-of-eliminating-black-fever-kala-azar/a-...

Measles has exploded in Europe. Clinicians say it's only a matter of time before outbreaks hit Canada
Lauren Pelley, Amina Zafar | Feb 03, 2024

Global travel, slumping vaccination rates has led to post-pandemic surge of infections...

There were 42,200 measles cases across more than 40 European countries last year, ... a more than 40-fold increase from 2022, which saw fewer than 1,000 cases. In December, ... there had been more than 20,000 hospitalizations and at least five deaths in the European region.

Globally, the situation is even grimmer, with a spike in infections in 2022 that included nine million known cases and 136,000 reported deaths, mostly among children.

The WHO said the rise in cases in Europe has accelerated in recent months, and the upward trend is expected to continue if urgent measures — like vaccination efforts — aren't taken to prevent further spread of this potentially deadly infection...

Canada, like many other countries, hasn't hit the 95 per cent vaccination coverage required to prevent its spread...In Europe, the level of coverage with two doses of the measles vaccine dropped from 92 per cent in 2019 to 91 per cent by 2022...

https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/measles-has-exploded-in-europe-clinicians-say-it-...

Clinical trial results for pancreatic and colorectal cancer KRAS vaccine
Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center | 4 Feb 2024

The phase 1 trial involved 25 patients whose pancreatic or colorectal cancer had certain KRAS mutations and were at high risk of the cancer returning after surgery. The results demonstrated this vaccine is safe and appears to stimulate the patient's immune system to create cancer-fighting cells:

84% of patients had the desired immune response, meaning that immune T cells targeting KRAS-mutated cancer cells were activated and grew in number.
Also in 84% of patients, a marker for lingering cancer cells -; the amount of tumor DNA circulating in the blood -; was reduced. In 24% of patients, the tumor DNA was completely absent.
Perhaps most significant, patients who had a higher T cell response also experienced a longer time without the disease returning, known as relapse-free survival.

In patients whose immune system appeared to respond to the vaccine, the recurrence of cancer was delayed compared with patients who did not respond to the vaccine. That's the type of early clinical effect we can build on." {Eileen O'Reilly, MD, medical oncologist and pancreatic cancer specialist}...

https://www.news-medical.net/news/20240202/New-vaccine-may-be-potential-off-the-...
-------------------------------------------------

Pant, S., et al. (2024). Lymph-node-targeted, mKRAS-specific amphiphile vaccine in pancreatic and colorectal cancer: the phase 1 AMPLIFY-201 trial. Nature Medicine. doi.org/10.1038/s41591-023-02760-3. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-023-02760-3

Prominent Anti-Vaxxer’s Snake Oil Store Has a Propaganda Outlet
Karam Bales 02/12/24

The Wellness Company (TWC) — the supplements purveyor for which soon-to-be-board-decertified, anti-vax cardiologist Dr. Peter McCullough serves as chief medical officer — has recently gotten some appropriately bad press

...nattokinase*...antibiotics...ivermectin...hydroxychloroquine...budesonide**...MAGA...

https://whowhatwhy.org/science/health-medicine/prominent-anti-vaxxers-snake-oil-...

* Nattokinase is an enzyme extracted and purified from a Japanese food called nattō. Nattō is produced by fermentation by adding the bacterium Bacillus subtilis var natto, which also produces the enzyme, to boiled soybeans. (Wikipedia)

**Budesonide, a corticosteroid that can have serious side effects. https://www.drugs.com/mtm/budesonide.html

Simon Kuestenmacher @simongerman600 | 6:30 AM · Feb 15, 2024:
German #geographer and #demographer in #Melbourne. I curate #maps and #data that explain how the #world works.

The haves and the have-nots. Map shows the countries with the highest {80} and lowest {60} life expectancy as of 2019.

https://twitter.com/simongerman600/status/1758091290388975627/photo/1
Source: http://buff.ly/2PAqw6A

Largest multicountry COVID study links vaccines to potential adverse effects
Joseph Choi - 02/19/24

A new study on {Pfizer, Moderna and AstraZeneca} COVID-19 vaccines that looked at nearly 100 million vaccinated individuals

...Researchers observed a “significant increase” in cases of Guillain-Barré syndrome among those who received the AstraZeneca vaccine with 42 days of administration.

They also noted higher-than-expected instances of acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (ADEM), inflammation of the brain and spinal cord, among those who received their first dose of Moderna’s vaccine.

However, the study noted that when it came to ADEM there was “no consistent pattern in terms of vaccine or timing following vaccination, and larger epidemiological studies have not confirmed any potential association.”

Both mRNA vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna were associated with instances of myocarditis, inflammation of the heart muscle, which occurred more than was expected in the study, with the condition having a significant observed-to-expected ratio consistently after the first, second and third doses.

Significantly higher than expected cases of pericarditis, inflammation of the sac-like structure that surrounds the heart, were also observed following first and fourth doses of Moderna’s vaccine.

“The safety signals identified in this study should be evaluated in the context of their rarity, severity, and clinical relevance...Moreover, overall risk–benefit evaluations of vaccination should take the risk associated with infection into account, as multiple studies demonstrated higher risk of developing the events under study, such as GBS, myocarditis, or ADEM, following SARS-CoV-2 infection than vaccination.”...

https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/4477406-largest-multi-country-covid-study-...

Florida health official repeats debunked claim that Covid mRNA vaccines contain 'DNA-changing virus
Carina CHENG, AFP Hong Kong | Updated 26 February 2024

Medical experts have reiterated that Covid-19 mRNA vaccines cannot change a person's DNA after Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo made the false claim in a January 2024 interview with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson. The World Health Organization (WHO) has previously debunked the long-running misinformation, saying "mRNA vaccines are not live virus vaccines and do not interfere with human DNA."...

https://factcheck.afp.com/doc.afp.com.34JP9XV

New mRNA Pancreatic Cancer Vaccine Trial Starts Next Phase
Jim Stallard Friday, October 20, 2023

...The new trial is investigating whether this therapeutic vaccine reduces the risk of pancreatic cancer returning after the tumor is removed by surgery. The study will enroll approximately 260 patients at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSK) and nearly 80 sites around the world...

https://www.mskcc.org/news/can-mrna-vaccines-fight-pancreatic-cancer-msk-clinica...
------------------------------------------

RECRUITING:
A Study of the Efficacy and Safety of Adjuvant Autogene Cevumeran Plus Atezolizumab and mFOLFIRINOX Versus mFOLFIRINOX Alone in Participants With Resected Pancreatic Ductal Adenocarcinoma (IMCODE003)

...This section provides the contact details for those conducting the study, and information on where this study is being conducted.

Study Contact
Name: Reference Study ID Number: GO44479 https://forpatients.roche.com/
Phone Number: 888-662-6728 (U.S. Only)
Email: global-roche-genentech-trials@gene.com {global?}...

https://clinicaltrials.gov/study/NCT05968326#contacts-and-locations

>102 margd: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/jWuKNwKYN3Y points out that even in just the US, or even in Texas alone, there's wide swings in life expectancy, depending on where you live and how much you make.

Column: As measles spreads, ‘herd stupidity’ grips Florida’s government
Michael Hiltzik | Feb. 27, 2024

{Feb 20 letter to parents & guardians doesn't recommend vaccine or quarantine of unvaxxed (for now) during measles outbreak https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/24437152/file_1664.pdf }

...{Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo's} inadequate response to the outbreak finally has some Floridians and the state’s media taking note of the danger his policies represent to the health and well-being of Florida’s children and others. But given the virulence of measles, it may be too late.

https://www.latimes.com/business/story/2024-02-27/as-measles-spreads-herd-stupid...

Barbara Comstock @BarbaraComstock | 8:05 PM · Mar 2, 2024 from McLean, VA. ABC News •Former VA10 Rep. •FormerVA Delegate •Lawyer

Trump said in Richmond, that he will take all federal funds away from public schools that require vaccines. Like most states, Virginia requires MMR vaccine, chickenpox vaccine, polio, etc. So Trump would take millions in federal funds away from all Virginia public schools.

Just 12 People Are Behind Most Vaccine Hoaxes On Social Media, Research Shows
Shannon Bond | May 14, 2021
Heard on All Things Considered (4 min)
https://www.npr.org/2021/05/13/996570855/disinformation-dozen-test-facebooks-twi...

Chemicals Found In Popular Household Products Potentially Linked To Autism, Multiple Sclerosis, Study Suggests
Arianna Johnson (Forbes) | 25 March 2024

Key Facts
The researchers examined over 1,800 common household chemicals—which they believe lacked research on their potential link to brain health—and discovered two that may have a negative effect on brain health: quaternary ammonium compounds (also called “quats” or QACs) and organophosphate flame retardants...

Quats are found in products like body washes, fabric softeners, shampoos, sunscreens, baby wipes, shaving creams and disinfectants like some Lysol, Clorox and Downy products.

Organophosphate flame retardants are found in electronic devices, building materials and furniture via flame retardant foam and plastic, according to the environmental advocacy program the Green Science Policy Institute.

Quats cause oligodendrocytes—brain cells that generate the protective layer around nerve cells—to die, while organophosphate flame retardants prevent them from maturing, according to the study.

Research shows disrupted oligodendrocytes production is tied to neurological disorders like multiple sclerosis and autism, so the study researchers believe they’ve uncovered a “previously unrecognized risk factor for neurological disease,” Paul Tesar, study author and a director at the Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, said in a statement...

https://www.forbes.com/sites/ariannajohnson/2024/03/25/chemicals-found-in-popula...
-------------------------------------------------------------

Erin F Cohn et al. 2024. Pervasive environmental chemicals impair oligodendrocyte development. Nature Neuroscience (25 March 2024) https://www.nature.com/articles/s41593-024-01599-2
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margd: Vinegar can substitute for fabric softener, in my experience.

For shower spray I mix--
1t dish detergent +
1 T Finish (blue rinse for automatic dishwashers) +
1/2 c hydrogen peroxide +
1/2 c rubbing alcohol +
water to fill 32 oz. spray bottle.

(Finish has some weird chems in it, but none of those fingered in study? It helps sheet water off dishes, shower surfaces, so fewer water spots: I worry about drinking its residue via coffee cups & carafes, glasses, cooking pots etc., but figure/hope it's okay used on shower surfaces? Maybe I'll try leaving out Finish next time I mix up my shower spray, and see how it goes? ... Rubbing alcohol evaporates, so also helps reduce spotting?)

As a girl I once suffered 24 h of swimmer's itch, having gotten between cercariae emerging from snail in search of duck. Burrowing into this human they died, causing me extreme itchiness that calamine lotion did nothing to calm. So-o, Godspeed to researchers as they search for vaxx for the schistosome where HUMANs, not ducks are the final host!

Radical Vaccine Strategy Could Help Quash Parasite Afflicting Millions
Clare Watson | 08 April 2024

Using viruses that infect bacteria to detect proteins sprouted by a notorious parasite, scientists have honed in on possible vaccine targets for schistosomiasis, a neglected tropical disease that currently affects an estimated 600 million people worldwide, causing 280,000 deaths per year.

The Brazil-based team harnessed a method called phage display, which was first described in the 1980s, to probe Schistosoma parasites that cause the disease, faster and more comprehensively than previous, sluggish research efforts could muster...

https://www.sciencealert.com/radical-vaccine-strategy-could-help-quash-parasite-...
------------------------------------------------

Daisy Woellner-Santos et al. 2024. Schistosoma mansoni vaccine candidates identified by unbiased phage display screening in self-cured rhesus macaques. npj Vaccines volume 9, Article number: 5 (4 January 2024). Open access. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41541-023-00803-x

CDC Redacted Study on Myocarditis After COVID-19 Vaccination?
The redacted document, released as part of a FOIA request, was not a study.
Anna Rascouët-Paz | April 8, 2024

"FALSE"

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/cdc-redacted-study-myocarditis/

Plans to expand African vaccine production face steep hurdles
Jon Cohen | 16 Apr 2024

Moderna’s pause on Kenya project highlights difficulties in creating a competitive vaccine sector on the continent

In March 2022, when the pandemic was still raging, the messenger RNA (mRNA) company Moderna announced it would build a $500 million plant in Kenya to manufacture half a billion doses of its COVID-19 vaccine annually. “This is major,” Kenyan President William Ruto said at the time. The plant would help reduce Africa’s dependence on vaccines produced elsewhere, Ruto said—a situation that had turned disastrous during the pandemic—and bring economic benefits as well.

But Moderna may never break ground on the Kenya factory. On 11 April, the company said it had “paused its efforts” because not a single African country had ordered its COVID-19 vaccine since 2022, leading to $1 billion in losses and write-offs. The move triggered a bitter reaction from the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), which said, “Moderna is abandoning a commitment to build highly needed and relevant vaccine manufacturing capabilities in Africa.”

Moderna’s decision is a reality check of sorts for other schemes to increase vaccine production on the continent. Many are underway, including facilities in Rwanda, Senegal, and South Africa by the other big mRNA vaccine company, BioNTech, and an up to $1 billion investment by Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance. But there is no longer much demand for COVID-19 vaccines in Africa, and shots for many other diseases prevalent there are already produced cheaply and in large volumes elsewhere, making it hard to establish a market for local manufacturers. The continent also faces a lack of trained workers and weak regulatory systems for medical products...

...significant obstacles, according to a recent analysis* by Africa CDC, CHAI, and PATH, another U.S. nonprofit. Few African companies have the capacity to produce antigens, the pathogen components that trigger immune responses and are the core ingredient of any vaccine, the groups said. For that, the firms need foreign companies to transfer technologies, but few such deals exist, and securing them is difficult in part because African governments have not committed to buying African-made vaccines. African countries also need to strengthen their workforce and their ability to evaluate and approve vaccines, the report says.

Any African vaccine manufacturer will face stiff competition from vaccines produced elsewhere. The Serum Institute of India, which produces more vaccine doses than any other company, is already a major supplier to Gavi. If a string of smaller rivals arise on the African continent, “you’re not going to have volume, and they won’t be competitive on the global marketplace,” predicts Seth Berkley, who headed Gavi for 12 years until retiring in August 2023. That same year, South Africa’s government purchased a pneumococcal vaccine made in India because it cost less than one produced at home.

To avoid fragmentation of Africa’s budding market, the Regionalized Vaccine Manufacturing Collaborative**, announced in January, aims to streamline and coordinate efforts. Ideally, countries in a region will pool resources, make bulk purchases of supplies, and evaluate demand together. Nkengasong says Africa may best be served by two or three vaccine manufacturing networks. “You can have glass produced in Zimbabwe and lipids produced in Kenya, and they can assemble the vaccine somewhere else,” he says. “Use the African Union platform to bring everybody together so that you can share information in real time and let them realize, ‘Oh, I don’t want to go do this all by myself.’”

If in the end African-produced vaccines can’t compete on cost, one solution would be to simply pay more for them. A November 2022 report*** from Gavi noted that the alliance does not generally shell out extra money for doses “in the name of geographical diversity and supply security,” but suggested it should consider doing so. Ndembi predicts that with the lessons from the pandemic in mind, African governments will be willing to pay a bonus for local products as well. “This is a health security issue,” he says.

https://www.science.org/content/article/plans-expand-african-vaccine-production-...

* https://www.path.org/our-impact/resources/current-and-planned-vaccine-manufactur...
** https://initiatives.weforum.org/regionalized-vaccine-manufacturing-collaborative...
*** https://www.gavi.org/news-resources/knowledge-products/expanding-sustainable-vac...

What were the death tolls from pandemics in history?
Saloni Dattani | December 7, 2023

Pandemics have killed millions of people throughout history. How many deaths were caused by different pandemics, and how have researchers estimated their death tolls?...

A Timeline of Pandemics (https://twitter.com/MaxCRoser/status/1781984749210173882/photo/1)

...The world can respond more swiftly and effectively to pandemic risks and avoid and reduce the impact of future pandemics. But without such efforts, we will continue to face major pandemics as we have experienced so far...

https://ourworldindata.org/historical-pandemics

Refuting a list of anti-vaccine claims and tropes once again
Michael Simpson* 2024-04-21

Anti-vaccine claims about suing manufacturers
Anti-vaccine claims about hepatitis B vaccine
Vaccine ingredients
Double-blind, placebo studies
Unvaccinated children not spreading disease
Vaccine choices in democracies
Summary of anti-vaccine claims

https://www.skepticalraptor.com/skepticalraptorblog.php/refuting-a-list-of-anti-...

* Michael Simpson, Chief Executive Officer at SkepticalRaptor. Lifetime lover of science, especially biomedical research. Spent years in academics, business development, research, and traveling the world shilling for Big Pharma.

https://granitegeek.concordmonitor.com/2024/04/21/anti-vax-bills-get-approval-fr...
Anti-vax bills get approval from GOP in NH House

A couple of anit-vaccine bills are making it through the GOP-controlled NH House.

One would remove all vaccine requirements (including polio!) for children entering daycare or private kindergarten (HB 1213), leaving it in place only for public school, while another (HB1194) that tries to sidestep vaccine requirements by changing the definition of “noncommunicable disease”, removing “infectious” as part of the definition, leaving only “transmissible from person-to-person.”

WHO African Region WHOAFRO | 2:11 AM · Apr 25, 2024

Today, Benin 🇧🇯 will introduce the malaria vaccine into the routine vaccination schedule for babies aged 6, 7, 9, and 18 months.
@MSbeninOfficiel, WHO, @UNICEF, and @USAID conducted a community drive to create awareness on the importance of #Malaria vaccination for children.

OMS Benin photos
https://twitter.com/WHOAFRO/status/1783378190519386352/photo/1
https://twitter.com/WHOAFRO/status/1783378190519386352/photo/2
https://twitter.com/WHOAFRO/status/1783378190519386352/photo/3
https://twitter.com/WHOAFRO/status/1783378190519386352/photo/4
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Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance gavi | 2:30 AM · Apr 25, 2024:

On #WorldMalariaDay Benin is taking a vital step in the fight to #endmalaria by beginning to administer the world’s first malaria vaccine! We’re proud to support efforts to tackle #malaria in a country that saw ~5.1 million cases & 11,000 deaths in 2022:

“I’ve had enough of witnessing despair”: relief and hope greet Benin’s malaria vaccine roll-out
Edna Fleure | 23 April 2024

On April 25, Benin will begin administering RTS,S malaria vaccines to children, in a move experts anticipate will turn the tide on a disease that claims more than 10,000 lives a year...

https://www.gavi.org/vaccineswork/enough-witnessing-despair-relief-hope-greet-be...
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World Health Organization (WHO) WHO | 10:56 AM · Apr 25, 2024:

#Malaria is PREVENTABLE. Lower the risk of getting malaria through:
✅ mosquito nets
✅ mosquito repellents
✅ antimalarial medicines
✅ malaria vaccine

And don't forget to wear protective clothing.

Learn more 👉https://bit.ly/44bRXGf

Image (https://twitter.com/WHO/status/1783510426812059657/photo/1)
PAHO/WHO and 9 others

Global immunization efforts have saved at least 154 million lives over the past 50 years
WHO | 24 April 2024

A major landmark study to be published by The Lancet reveals that global immunization efforts have saved an estimated 154 million lives – or the equivalent of 6 lives every minute of every year – over the past 50 years. The vast majority of lives saved – 101 million – were those of infants.

The study, led by the World Health Organization (WHO), shows that immunization is the single greatest contribution of any health intervention to ensuring babies not only see their first birthdays but continue leading healthy lives into adulthood.

Of the vaccines included in the study, the measles vaccination had the most significant impact on reducing infant mortality, accounting for 60% of the lives saved due to immunization. This vaccine will likely remain the top contributor to preventing deaths in the future.

Over the past 50 years, vaccination against 14 diseases (diphtheria, Haemophilus influenzae type B, hepatitis B, Japanese encephalitis, measles, meningitis A, pertussis, invasive pneumococcal disease, polio, rotavirus, rubella, tetanus, tuberculosis, and yellow fever) has directly contributed to reducing infant deaths by 40% globally, and by more than 50% in the African Region...

https://www.who.int/news/item/24-04-2024-global-immunization-efforts-have-saved-...

Henry Madison {PhD} @RageSheen | 3:46 PM · Apr 29, 2024:
https://twitter.com/RageSheen/status/1785033017481949545

Many who still mask have discovered a health they’ve never had in their whole lives. It’s glorious to be free of colds and flu, for example.

And in this they’re following a longstanding trend in Asia. 60% of the world lives in Asia...
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Not Just Coronavirus: Asians Have Worn Face Masks for Decades
Ralph Jennings | March 11, 2020

...Asians, especially in Japan, China and Taiwan, have worn masks for a host of cultural and environmental reasons, including non-medical ones, since at least the 1950s.

Japanese wear masks when feeling sick as a courtesy to stop any sneezes from landing on other people. Japanese women mask their faces on days when they don’t have time to put on makeup. Philippine motorcycle riders wear masks to deflect vehicular exhausts in heavy traffic. In Taiwan, citizens say masks keep their faces warm in the winter and offer a sense of protection from air pollution, including any airborne germs...

https://www.voanews.com/a/science-health_coronavirus-outbreak_not-just-coronavir...

Even as bird flu looms, the world is unlearning Covid’s lessons
Dylan Scott | May 8, 2024

...In December 2021, the World Health Assembly, the governing body of the World Health Organization, announced that it would “draft and negotiate a convention, agreement or other international instrument … to strengthen pandemic prevention, preparedness and response.” The goal was to create a binding international agreement that would compel countries around the world to take steps to prevent future pandemics and, should those efforts fail, to ensure smoother coordination in any future public health emergency.

Negotiators are supposed to largely wrap up their work by Friday, May 10. Representatives from the world’s governments will convene in Geneva on May 27 for the World Health Assembly. The plan is for the pandemic accord to be ratified before the assembly adjourns.

Even with the threat of H5N1 looming, however, it has become clear the world is downsizing its ambitions for the treaty. In place of firm commitments are vague aspirations.

On two important sections — the One Health measures and the establishment of a system to share pathogens between countries — the latest draft text would defer momentous operational decisions until at least 2026....

{1. One Health} commitments that called for stronger animal surveillance, more research and more education for health workers and communities, and a “whole of government” and “whole of society” approach.

In the latest draft, much of that language has been removed. Governments are given more leeway to “promote” and “engage” One Health principles as they see fit. The problem is — again — money.

...{2. PABS} pathogen access and benefit sharing ... The idea is that rich countries or the pharma manufacturers should pay for access to pathogens of concern that are identified in developing countries and commit to sharing the benefits derived from that access — i.e., diagnostics and vaccines that are ultimately produced — with those poorer countries. That provision has been a priority for the developing world after the pandemic, when Covid-19 vaccines were slow to reach low-income nations in Africa and the rest of the world.

But the rich countries don’t like it. They, along with the pharmaceutical companies they represent, argue such a system would be too bureaucratic and risk slowing down innovation in a future public health emergency.

Some experts have noted the irony of the US and Europe insisting on unfettered access to pathogens from low-income countries at the same time the US government is facing criticism for being slow to share data about H5N1....

https://www.vox.com/24151110/bird-flu-h5n1-pandemic-treaty-prevention-response