Finally, the perfect intersection of cute and dystopian. https://t.co/KKjuTJLGFf
— Detective Pikajew (@clapifyoulikeme) April 10, 2020
Sarah Gilbert, professor of vaccinology at Oxford University, told The Times on Saturday that she is “80% confident” the vaccine would work, and could be ready by September. “it’s not just a hunch, and as every week goes by we have more data to look at.” https://t.co/e7FFAgZag3
— Carl Quintanilla (@carlquintanilla) April 11, 2020
… Gilbert’s team is one of dozens worldwide working on a vaccine and is the most advanced in Britain, she told the Times. As the country looks set to begin its fourth week under lockdown, a vaccine could be fundamental in easing the measures and returning to normal life. Gilbert said human trials are due to start in the next two weeks…
Manufacturing the millions of vaccine doses necessary could take months. Gilbert said she’s in discussions with the British government about funding, and starting production before the final results are in, allowing the public to access the vaccine immediately if it proves to work. She said success by the autumn was “just about possible if everything goes perfectly.”
Lots of good info on that process here:
In which @rkhamsi raises some important questions that the world is going to have to grapple with over the next few months about #Covid19 vaccine & equity. https://t.co/5FCf9I3aI0
— Helen Branswell (@HelenBranswell) April 10, 2020
Where the #COVID19 #pandemic stands as of today. pic.twitter.com/MhA1klmLd2
— Laurie Garrett (@Laurie_Garrett) April 10, 2020
Coronavirus lockdowns across the globe should not be completely lifted until a vaccine for the disease is found, according to a study based on China’s outbreak published in medical journal The Lancet. https://t.co/The8rUYE6W
— CNN International (@cnni) April 11, 2020
And Wuhan’s wet markets are also coming back to life. Read this smart myth-busting story by @KarolineCQKan who explains how they’re a vital source of food across China and Asia that are more akin to farmers’ markets.https://t.co/gBkRNQrJRV
— Sharon Chen (@sharonchenhm) April 11, 2020
WHO says looking into reports of some COVID patients testing positive again https://t.co/JaRlyb036B pic.twitter.com/KPONogjuMb
— Reuters (@Reuters) April 11, 2020
India to extend lockdown, scheduled to end on Tuesday, to control spread of the coronavirus, officials sayhttps://t.co/TLqJOu7P6h pic.twitter.com/Tc3BknZ5zb
— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) April 11, 2020
How the Indian state of Kerala flattened its coronavirus curve.
Aggressive testing, contact tracing and cooked meals. https://t.co/PWgFoZIGMx
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) April 11, 2020
Don’t listen to those who say South Koreans comply with social distancing because …Confucianism. This is a country that fought for democracy and impeached a president, a vocal democracy that has held those in power to account. And this is the result..https://t.co/sWUNgzOKyr
— Laura Bicker (@BBCLBicker) April 11, 2020
Malaysia reports 184 new coronavirus cases, death toll rises by 3 https://t.co/OPPtBanm7Q
— The Straits Times (@STcom) April 11, 2020
Indonesia reports 330 new coronavirus cases, 21 deaths https://t.co/nCrSlEIz19 pic.twitter.com/e2nr8Wj4X0
— Reuters (@Reuters) April 11, 2020
Iran has been struck by one of the most severe #COVID19 outbreaks in the world.
~70,000 Iranians have been infected w/ #coronavirus & >4,000 people have died. The human toll has gone largely unnoticed in the West, absorbed by deaths in Italy, Spain & US.https://t.co/1MfGkTSdgX
— Microbes&Infection (@MicrobesInfect) April 11, 2020
Stolen from the Russian interwebs.
There are three ways to fight a pandemic:
1. Chinese: to spend a ton of money into enforcing the strictest of quarantines.
2. Swedish: to do nothing.
3. Russian: to declare the Chinese way, to realize the Swedish way, to split the difference.— Slava Malamud (@SlavaMalamud) April 10, 2020
Leave doping ban in past amid virus outbreak, Russia says: https://t.co/s4ilwYiQFs
— James Ellingworth (@jellingworth) April 10, 2020
JUST IN: Spain’s coronavirus death toll has fallen to an 18-day low
— The Spectator Index (@spectatorindex) April 11, 2020
I asked Matt Hancock 9 days ago if, in hindsight, it had been a mistake to allow large gatherings like Cheltenham to go ahead given the rising death rate (was 450 a day then). I was just told they had followed scientific advice. That’s the stock answer. https://t.co/wPr1LwCoAo
— Kevin Schofield (@PolhomeEditor) April 11, 2020
A group of international vacationers who flew from London to the south of France in a private jet were turned away by French police after they landed. A nationwide lockdown is in place to prevent the spread of coronavirus. https://t.co/u356cceouZ
— CNN International (@cnni) April 11, 2020
A new wave of billions of locusts is arriving in East Africa. It’s the top concern in rural areas. The coronavirus? A distant second. https://t.co/nO51p59JSz
— AP Africa (@AP_Africa) April 10, 2020
Sub-Saharan Africa will suffer first recession for 25 years because of coronavirus outbreak, World Bank predicts https://t.co/ToeM3V6cdb
— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) April 9, 2020
Vulnerabilities within Kenya’s informal sector of nearly 15 million workers have been brutally exposed by the pandemic.https://t.co/i6GgR6RG65
— Foreign Policy (@ForeignPolicy) April 11, 2020
A 15-year-old boy from an isolated Amazonian tribe who tested positive for Covid-19 has died, raising concerns about the coronavirus’ impact on the region’s indigenous people. https://t.co/nut5g3MufX
— CNN International (@cnni) April 11, 2020
Could the new coronavirus weaken ‘anti-vaxxers’? https://t.co/sNp2m2cwVd pic.twitter.com/g3dRJEZZJp
— Reuters (@Reuters) April 11, 2020
Lifting coronavirus lockdown too soon would spark ‘deadly resurgence,’ warns WHO https://t.co/kPY6U0ZjlD
— The Independent (@Independent) April 11, 2020
Amir Khalid
I was going to post a link to Malaysia’s daily numbers as usual, but I see you already have them. I notice the dig at Malaysia from the Singapore-based Straits Times*. Remember that Singapore hasn’t much more to deal with than a city, and that Indonesia and Thailand have not been testing anywhere near as many people as they need to.
I can say that the Malaysia’s confirmed case number is high because its testing is focused on those who have likely had contact with other confirmed cases. The Health Ministry here defends this approach as the best use of its resources and I have not seen an argument that it’s inadequate.
*Not to be confused wth the KL-based New Straits Times.
Sloane Ranger
That’s a hell of a lot of confidence. I just hope the human trials bear it out.
Even if it works, there will be a delay in manufacturing the vaccine and distributing it so a year to 18 months still looks likely.
Sloane Ranger
@Amir Khalid:
Ye Gods, that’s almost as bad as the Bank of Scotland versus the Royal Bank of Scotland!
Also, I forgot in my previous post but the vacationers turned back at Marseilles Airport should embarrass even other super rich, arrogant, entitled white men!
debbie
@Sloane Ranger:
She’s obviously read Art of the Deal. Lie three times and it becomes a fact. //
Amir Khalid
@Sloane Ranger:
There used to be just The Straits Times in Singapore. Then in 1965 Singapore was expelled from the Federation of Malaysia. The New Straits Times was subsequently set up in KL by former Straits Times people because one newspaper could not serve two different political masters — their PM and our PM — who hated each other’s guts.
YY_Sima Qian
More Chinese data on importation of COVID-19 cases from Russia: 22 more confirm cases at Suifenhe border crossing yesterday, plus 27 at the Manzhouli border crossing in Inner Mongolia. 25 confirmed cases two days on a single flight from Moscow that landed at Taiyuan, in Shanxi Province in northern China. The flight was originally schedule to fly into Beijing, but many flights have been diverted to Inner Mongolia or Shanxi to reduce the screening and quarantine burden in Beijing, and reduce the risk of a second wave in the capital. Note that the date of confirmation does not necessarily mean the date of entry, most of the cases are of people already under the mandatory 14 day quarantine. All in all, there have been 248 imported confirmed cases from Russia, second only to 282 from the UK, and more than the 152 from the US. I have not seen the asymptomatic cases compiled, but likely similar in number to the confirmed cases. There are a lot more Chinese expatriates and students in the US and the UK, and a lot more returnees. Looking at these numbers, I am not surprised to hear that Russia may be in fact executing the Swedish strategy by default, for all of the public showing of tough measures.
In the meantime, there has been a string of domestic confirmed and asymptomatic cases (< 20 total, I think) in Guangzhou in recent days, most connected to four confirmed cases among the influx of African immigrants in the city (two Nigerian nationals, one Chinese national married to one of the Nigerians, and a Liberian national). Guangzhou has always had a substantial population of Africans traders (numbering in the tens of thousands, some illegally overstaying their visas). Racism and discrimination against the African community has always bubbled beneath the surface for a segment of the Chinese population, and not just in Guangzhou. The recent COVID-19 cases has awakened an upsurge of xenophobia, both online and in the streets of Guangzhou. Africans (and Americans and Europeans of African descent) are sometimes refused service in bars and restaurants, and refused lodging in hotels.
For background, racism and stereotyping against Africans in China is somewhat different than that in Europe or North America, as it is not influenced by baggage associated with colonialism and slavery, more born out of ignorance and fear of the other; it many ways it is similar to the nativism shown against people from other provinces in China, or ethnic minority groups in China (such as Uighurs), or shown by some people in Hong Kong and Taiwan against Mainlanders. However, it can still be ugly. Fortunately, such sentiments has not led to violence or physical harassment against Africans to date, and the Chinese government has generally taken pains not to fan the nativist flames. Even as the CCP regime has instituted draconian measures against Uighurs and Tibetans it deems threatening or suspicious, the propaganda and bureaucratic machinery have never painted these minority groups as the “Other”, to be feared and ostracized. I think the regime is fully cognizant of the volatility and destructiveness of such forces, if unleashed.
Amir Khalid
This year the world’s Muslims are going to see Ramadhan without Ramadhan bazaars or communal tarawikh prayers, and without Eid visits to friends and family. And a few months later, no Haj and no Eid al-Adha celebrations either, because it’s for damn sure the pandemic will not be over by then.
YY_Sima Qian
@Amir Khalid: All mass gatherings and mass movement can be expected to be cancelled, until vaccines are widely available and widely used. Mainland Chinese have already had Chinese New Year and Tomb Sweeping Festival essentially cancelled. Mid-Autumn Festival in early September is typically a time for family reunions. I suspect it will also be heavily curtailed.
artem1s
“the public” as in the highest bidder. How much you wanna bet Dumbass was on the phone with her this morning trying to strong arm the lab into US only access. This administration will absolutely impede any progress on the production of a vaccine no matter what.
Third law of stupidity applies and always will with this maladministration:
A stupid person is a person who causes losses to another person or to a group of persons while himself deriving no gain and even possibly incurring losses.
J R in WV
@artem1s:
I actually suspect Trump and his minions don’t care about being uniquely able to use a new medication or vaccine… I believe they want exclusive rights to American use of the new drugs or vaccines, so as to be able to profit maximally from their captive market.
Imagine what well to do people would pay to get access to a vaccine that would allow them to resume their party-heavy schedule weeks before the peons and wage-earners can gob ack to work. Of course, I remember the first polio vaccinations, back in the mid-1950s, which were provided free of charge to everyone.
People stood in line for hours to receive their injections of Salk vaccine. At the family business Health Department nurses came to the offices and set up a nursing station where all employees, all their family and the neighbors could come to town for polio vaccinations. I remember it in color, as if it happened yesterday.
Then in just a couple of years, everyone stood in line to get a tiny paper cup with their sugar cube with a tiny dot of pink Sabin refrigerated oral vaccine. That was at the elementary school on the neighborhood, and IIRC both sets of vaccinations were repeated later on. But I’m not sure about that. Maybe not as if it happened yesterday, it did happen something like 65 years ago…
Trump sees nothing but a chance to profit by billions of dollars if some medication/vaccination becomes available before the election. Also to lock in his re-election by posing as the savior of the world from the dread Wuhan Flu pandemic… as opposed to his current position as chief cause of the Trump Pandemic of the USA.
Calouste
@Sloane Ranger: Bill Gates plans on funding the construction of factories for the 7 most promising vaccines candidates (to the tune of billions of dollars), even though he knows that only one or two of them will work and the others will be wasted. Just so that when a vaccine is proven to be effective it can immediately be produced and distributed at scale instead of having to wait months.
Emma
@Amir Khalid: I apologize on their behalf. “Malaysia boleh” jokes are unfortunately the great unifier for Singaporeans. You gotta admit, outside of COVID-19, Najib and Mahathir alone have given us tons to poke fun at.