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not exactly sure what happens to the ahac shares. Are they converted to a new company ?
Re: AHAC > Lots of hype but they do have POC, a huge market and a huge moat...
Arterial reconstruction with human bioengineered acellular blood vessels in patients with peripheral arterial disease
https://humacyte.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/2020.-Gutowski_JVS-Arterial-reconstruction-with-human-bioengineered.pdf
Results: Twenty HAVs were placed in the arterial, above-knee, femoral-to-popliteal position in patients with rest pain
(n ¼ 3) or symptomatic claudication (n ¼ 17). All HAVs functioned as intended and had no evidence of structural failure
or rejection by the recipient. No acute HAV infections were reported, but three surgical site infections were documented during the study period. Three non-HAV-related deaths were reported. One vessel developed a pseudoaneurysm after suspected iatrogenic injury during a balloon thrombectomy. No amputations of the HAV implanted limb occurred over the 2-year period, and no HAV infections were reported in approximately 34 patient-years of continuous patient follow-up.
Conclusions: Human tissue engineered blood vessels can be manufactured and readily available for peripheral arterial
bypass surgery. Early clinical experience with these vessels, in the arterial position, suggest that they are safe, have
acceptable patency, a low incidence of infection, and do not require the harvest of autologous vein or any cells from the
recipient. Histologic examination of tissue biopsies revealed vascular remodeling and repopulation by host cells. This first in-man arterial bypass study supports the continued development of human tissue engineered blood vessels for arterial
reconstruction, and potential future expansion to clinical indications including vascular trauma and repair of other size appropriate peripheral arteries. (J Vasc Surg 2020;-:1-12.)
Keywords: Peripheral arterial disease; Arterial reconstruction; Bioengineered blood vessel; HAV
NVAX > up $20 AH on deal to supply 1.1B doses of COVAX vaccine...
Novavax, coronavirus shot data in hand, strikes an eye-popping supply deal with global vaccine consortium
https://www.fiercepharma.com/pharma/novavax-heels-coronavirus-shot-data-enters-massive-supply-deal-global-vaccine-consortium
Novavax on Thursday unveiled a memorandum of understanding with Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, to provide 1.1 billion doses of its coronavirus vaccine candidate to COVAX, a global effort to ensure equitable vaccine distribution. The Serum Institute of India will help produce doses under a prior deal between that company and Gavi.
The deal will support work by Gavi, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations and the World Health Organization to distribute doses in every country worldwide.
GameStop frenzy brought the market 'dangerously close' to collapse, says Interactive Brokers founder Thomas Petterffy
https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/gamestop-reddit-frenzy-market-collapse-thomas-petterffy-interactive-brokers-2021-2-1030098476
Interactive Brokers Group Chairman and founder Thomas Peterffy said the country's financial markets came "dangerously close" to collapsing during the Reddit-fueled GameStop frenzy last month, more than the public realized.
"We have come dangerously close to the collapse of the entire system and the public seems to be completely unaware of that, including Congress and the regulators," Peterffy told CNBC in an interview on Wednesday.
PFE is Michael Burry's (The Big Short) 2nd largest position...
https://whalewisdom.com/filer/scion-asset-management-llc#tabholdings_tab_link
The Texas grid got crushed because its operators didn’t see the need to prepare for cold weather
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/02/16/ercot-texas-electric-grid-failure/
(WAPO article behind a paywall so posting here)
Republicans blame frozen wind turbines, but the problem was much bigger than that
Feb. 16, 2021 at 5:40 p.m. EST
When it gets really cold, it can be hard to produce electricity, as customers in Texas and neighboring states are finding out. But it’s not impossible. Operators in Alaska, Canada, Maine, Norway and Siberia do it all the time.
What has sent Texas reeling is not an engineering problem, nor is it the frozen wind turbines blamed by prominent Republicans. It is a financial structure for power generation that offers no incentives to power plant operators to prepare for winter. In the name of deregulation and free markets, critics say, Texas has created an electric grid that puts an emphasis on cheap prices over reliable service.
It’s a “Wild West market design based only on short-run prices,” said Matt Breidert, a portfolio manager at a firm called TortoiseEcofin.
And yet the temporary train wreck of that market Monday and Tuesday has seen the wholesale price of electricity in Houston go from $22 a megawatt-hour to about $9,000. Meanwhile, 4 million Texas households have been without power.
One utility company, Griddy, which sells power at wholesale rates to retail customers without locking in a price in advance, told its patrons Tuesday to find another provider before they get socked with tremendous bills.
The widespread failure in Texas and, to a lesser extent, Oklahoma and Louisiana in the face of a winter cold snap shines a light on what some see as the derelict state of America’s power infrastructure, a mirror reflection of the chaos that struck California last summer.
Edward Hirs, an energy fellow at the University of Houston, said the disinvestment in electricity production reminds him of the last years of the Soviet Union, or of the oil sector today in Venezuela.
“They hate it when I say that,” he said.
The immediate question facing the Texas power sector is whether its participants are willing to pay for the sort of winterization measures that are common farther north, even for a once-in-a-decade spell of weather.
Gov. Greg Abbott (R) called Tuesday for reform of the state’s electric grid operator, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, or ERCOT.
“Far too many Texans are without power and heat for their homes as our state faces freezing temperatures and severe winter weather,” he said in a statement. “This is unacceptable.”
He said he would work with the legislature to find ways to “ensure that our state never experiences power outages like this again.”
The Republican speaker of the Texas House, Dade Phelan, announced immediate hearings into “what went wrong.”
Fossil fuel groups and their Republican allies blamed the power failures on frozen wind turbines and warned against the supposed dangers of alternative power sources. Some turbines did in fact freeze — though Greenland and other northern outposts are able to keep theirs going through the winter.
But wind accounts for just 10 percent of the power in Texas generated during the winter. And the loss of power to the grid caused by shutdowns of thermal power plants, primarily those relying on natural gas, dwarfed the dent caused by frozen wind turbines, by a factor of five or six.
As the cold hit, demand for electricity soared past the mark that ERCOT had figured would be the maximum needed. But at a moment when the world is awash in surplus natural gas, much of it from Texas wells, the state’s power-generating operators were unable to turn that gas into electricity to meet that demand.
In the single-digit temperatures, pipelines froze up because there was some moisture in the gas. Pumps slowed. Diesel engines to power the pumps refused to start. One power plant after another went offline. Even a reactor at one of the state’s two nuclear plants went dark, hobbled by frozen equipment.
“At a time when the need is the greatest it’s ever been, it’s a strain on the system like we’ve never seen,” said Tom Seng, director of the School of Energy Economics, Policy and Commerce at the University of Tulsa.
Throughout the Southwest, he said, there has been a scramble for gas as sources have gone offline. Most surplus gas is stored underground, he said, and bringing it to the surface becomes more and more difficult in such prolonged low temperatures. March futures for natural gas are selling for $3 per million BTUs in Oklahoma, he said, but the spot price hit $600 over the weekend.
In Texas, production of natural gas Tuesday fell 6 billion to 7 billion cubic feet per day from earlier in the month, Anne Swedberg Robba, head of American gas and power analytics for S&P Global Platts, wrote in an email. Nationally, production has dropped by about 14 percent.
“But this is not the first time we’ve had this issue in Texas,” said Hirs, of the University of Houston.
There was a severe cold spell in the Southwest in 2011, and frigid weather in 1983, 1989, 2003, 2006, 2008 and 2010. A study by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the North American Electric Reliability Corp. of the 2011 event, which also led to widespread blackouts for much the same reasons, found that “the massive amount of generator failures that were experienced raises the question whether it would have been helpful to increase reserve levels going into the event. This action would have brought more units online earlier, might have prevented some of the freezing problems the generators experienced, and could have exposed operational problems in time to implement corrections before the units were needed to meet customer demand.”
On Tuesday, both agencies announced that they would now investigate the causes of this year’s failure.
Texas shares with California an unwillingness to compensate generation companies for maintenance, Hirs said, unlike most of the rest of the country. He said that what happened to California in the heat last summer has now been reflected in Texas’s winter.
“Both Texas and California have failed spectacularly this year,” he said. “There’s a tremendous human cost. People died in California. People died in Texas.”
Texas is unique among the states in having a grid all its own that is almost entirely cut off from the rest of the country. That has prevented Texas from importing much electricity as its power plants went down, but Hirs said that the cold is so widespread across the heart of the nation that no one has any electricity to spare anyway.
Bill Magness, chief executive of ERCOT, said in an interview with the WFAA TV station in Dallas that he thought the state grid was better prepared for winter than it once was.
“In 2018 we had some very cold winter times, but we saw the generation fleets performed very well through that,” he said. “I think we really made some progress getting ready for these winter times. And this storm has been extraordinary. We are seeing a whole lot of units coming off for reasons that have to do with the weather, so certainly winterization is something that constantly needs to be looked at.”
Although temporary, one factor that may have hurt was that the sudden high wholesale price of electricity may have caused ERCOT’s computers to order companies to “shed load” — that is, cut off customers — rather than deal with the spike in costs.
The state’s Public Utilities Commission ordered ERCOT on Monday to allow for those high prices. They almost certainly will not last long, as temperatures are already rising. The cost of that electricity, at least in the short run, probably will fall most heavily on the retail utilities.
HYLN > Hyliion Introduces Next Generation Battery Module to Improve Performance and Efficiency
https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210211005805/en/Hyliion-Introduces-Next-Generation-Battery-Module-to-Improve-Performance-and-Efficiency
AUSTIN, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Hyliion Holdings Corp. (NYSE: HYLN) (“Hyliion”), a leader in electrified powertrain solutions for Class 8 commercial vehicles, today announced the introduction of its next generation battery module which integrates Toshiba’s LTO cells with Hyliion’s technology advancements to achieve longer battery life, higher charging rates and improved safety. Building on Hyliion’s proprietary battery system, the battery module will be incorporated into the next evolution of Hyliion’s Hybrid system.
Leveraging previous battery experience and incorporating enhancements for improved battery cooling, the new module delivers multiple benefits tied to performance and allows for more than a 40 percent improvement in cooling compared to the previous system. Key benefits include:
Longer Life – Hyliion’s improved battery module is capable of up to 5 times as much cycle life than a conventional EV battery.
Higher Charging Rates – Improved heat dissipation allows for higher charge and discharge rates of the battery and longer sustained power output.
Speed – The battery can be recharged in under 8 minutes, an unprecedented charge time compared to other EV battery solutions.
Safety –The new module design reduces the operating temperature of the cells allowing for a safer operating environment.
The design has already passed UN 38.3 battery testing procedures and offers improvements to withstand the stresses and rigors incurred on the road.
A 10% market share for either Affinivax or Vaxcyte would be a huge success IMO and PCVX would be worth several multiples of where it is currently trading.
I have no idea if non-inferiority and 4 additional serotypes is enough to take meaningful market share away from PFE with or without a large pharma partner. The same applies to Affinivax. Non-inferiority based on surrogate immune endpoints is the quickest path to approval however it also paints their vaccine as "me too" product except for 4 additional serotypes. For either to differentiate their vaccine and pretty much guarantee blockbuster status they would likely have to prove superiority which which means large, long, drawn out trials mandating a large partner.
Vaxcyte's Vax-30 however could up the ante providing PFE has nothing similar in the works.
I don’t necessarily agree that our discussion of PVCX is moot
If VAX-24 merely shows non-inferiority to the older-generation vaccines (which is what the language in the S-1 filing suggests is the company’s aim), I doubt that that will be enough to make VAX-24 a success in the commercial marketplace.
Affinivax’s lead vaccine candidate, ASP3772, is a Streptococcus pneumoniae vaccine that is being co-developed in collaboration with Astellas Pharma Inc. ASP3772 includes 24 pneumococcal polysaccharides, more than any other vaccine on the market or in clinical testing today, as well as two conserved pneumococcal proteins. ASP3772 was observed to be safe and highly immunogenic in a Phase 1 study in adults. A Phase 2 study in adults is now completed with ongoing data analyses. The clinical program targeting the infant pneumococcal indication has been initiated with an ongoing Phase 1 study in healthy toddlers 12 to 15 months of age.
Dew, with your keen interest in vaccine companies I'm curious if you looked at Vaxcyte (PCVX), a recent IPO whose CEO is Grant Pickering, the COO is Jim Wassil the former head of Pfizer Vaccines and the Chairman is Moncef Slaoui the former Chairman of Vaccines at GlaxoSmithKline.
Vaxcyte is a spin-off from Sutro Biopharma and has licensed Sutro's Cell-Free Protein Synthesis platform to screen and produce carrier proteins for their vaccines. They claim their carrier protein is superior to proteins produced by random lysine conjugation because CFPS enables site-specific conjugation using less protein without sacrificing immunogenicity.
They have a 24-valent PCV (VAX-24) in the works with an IND filing expected in 2H-2021 and Phase 2 POC readout in 2022. They also have vaccine programs for Group A Strep and Periodontitis.
They look like they could be a player but obviously years away. Any thoughts?
hmmmmm...
Fecal transplant turns cancer immunotherapy non-responders into responders
https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2021-02/uop-ftt012921.php
Davar and colleagues collected fecal samples from patients who responded extraordinarily well to anti-PD-1 immunotherapy and tested for infectious pathogens before giving the samples, through colonoscopy, to advanced melanoma patients who had never previously responded to immunotherapy. The patients were then given the anti-PD-1 drug pembrolizumab. And it worked.
Out of 15 advanced melanoma patients who received the combined FMT and anti-PD-1 treatment, six showed either tumor reduction or disease stabilization lasting more than a year.
"The likelihood that the patients treated in this trial would spontaneously respond to a second administration of anti-PD-1 immunotherapy is very low," said study co-senior author Hassane Zarour, M.D., a cancer immunologist and co-leader of the CIIP at UPMC Hillman as well as a professor of medicine at Pitt. "So, any positive response should be attributable to the administration of fecal transplant."
Kia Motors Shares Jump After Report Apple to Invest $3.6 Billion
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-02-03/apple-to-invest-3-6-billion-in-kia-to-make-evs-donga-says
The iPhone maker plans to set up production with Kia and build Apple cars at the automaker’s facility in Georgia, U.S., DongA Ilbo reported, without citing anyone. The companies may sign a deal on Feb. 17 and aim to introduce Apple cars in 2024, according to the newspaper, which said they have an initial target to produce 100,000 autos a year.
ITRM> Sulopenum looks approvable unless I'm missing something. The Phase 3 failed against Cipro in the quinolone susceptible population but was superior to Cipro in the quinolone resistant population. These were prespecified populations.
Disclosure: I took a flier on ITRM about a month ago and also have it in the SI biotech contest. The FDA accepted ITRM's NDA application today with an Adcom scheduled for July 25.
From ITRM's 10Q...
https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1659323/000156459020054013/itrm-10q_20200930.htm
In the second quarter of 2020, we announced the results of our Phase 3 clinical trials in cUTI and uUTI. In the cUTI trial, sulopenem did not meet the primary endpoint of statistical non-inferiority compared to the control therapies with the difference in response rates driven almost entirely by higher rates of asymptomatic bacteriuria on the sulopenem IV to oral sulopenem arm relative to the ertapenem IV to oral ciprofloxacin arm, only evident at the test of cure visit. The rates of patients receiving additional antibiotics or with residual cUTI symptoms were similar between therapies. Similarly, in the uUTI trial, sulopenem did not meet the primary endpoint of statistical non-inferiority compared to ciprofloxacin in the population of patients with baseline pathogens susceptible to ciprofloxacin driven to a large degree by a greater amount of asymptomatic bacteriuria in the sulopenem treated patients at the test of cure visit relative to those receiving ciprofloxacin. However, in the uUTI trial, in the population of patients with baseline pathogens resistant to quinolones, sulopenem achieved the related primary endpoint by demonstrating superiority to ciprofloxacin, providing evidence of a treatment effect in patients with uUTI.Based on discussions with the FDA at a pre-New Drug Application, or NDA, meeting in September 2020 and previous correspondence with the FDA, we plan to proceed with an NDA submission for oral sulopenem for the treatment of uUTIs in patients with a quinolone non-susceptible pathogen in the fourth quarter of 2020.
Quinolone Non-susceptible Population
Overall Response (TOC)
Sulopenem 92/147 (62.6%)
Cipro 50/139 (36.0%)
Difference 26.6% (15.1, 37.4)
P value< 0.001
Reason for Failure: Asymptomatic bacteriuria
Sulopenum 27 (18.4%)
Cipro 38 (27.3%)
Clinical Response (TOC)
Sulopenum 122/147 (83.0%)
Cipro 87/139 (62.6%)
Difference 20.4% (10.2, 30.4)
P Value < 0.001
Overall Response (EOT)
Sulopenum 95/147 (64.6%)
Cipro 42/139 (30.2%)
Differnece 34.4% (23.1, 44.8)
P Value < 0.001
“The difference in the overall response to treatment in the population of patients with a quinolone susceptible baseline pathogen was driven to a large degree by a greater amount of asymptomatic bacteriuria in the sulopenem treated patients relative to those receiving ciprofloxacin,” observed Dr. Dunne. “This same finding was observed in the recently completed Phase 3 clinical trial of sulopenem in complicated urinary tract infections, SURE2. In that study, the difference in outcome between ertapenem and sulopenem was driven largely by the post therapy rate of asymptomatic bacteriuria and, notably, was lower only in those patients who received ertapenem followed by ciprofloxacin and not in any other pairwise comparison with sulopenem or ertapenem treated patients. The clinical significance of post treatment asymptomatic bacteriuria and its relationship to oral dosing with ciprofloxacin will be the focus of additional investigation.”
In the safety population of 1,660 patients, treatment related adverse events were observed in 11.4% and 11.9% of patients on sulopenem and ciprofloxacin, respectively. The most commonly reported adverse events were diarrhea, 7.3% and 7.6%, nausea, 3.4% and 4.0%, and headache 2.2% and 2.2%, for sulopenem and ciprofloxacin patients, respectively. Discontinuations due to adverse events were uncommon on both regimens and were seen in 1.1% of patients on sulopenem and 1.5% of patients on ciprofloxacin. Serious adverse events (SAE) were seen in 0.6% of patients on sulopenem with no drug-related SAE and 0.4% of patients on ciprofloxacin with one drug-related SAE.
Re: hydrogen sulfide
Eat garlic & onions...
'Rotten egg gas' hydrogen sulfide may allow us to live longer
Hydrogen sulfide — maligned for its toxic and explosive properties — may slow aging and block damaging chemical reactions inside cells, according to scientists in China, who reviewed studies on the malodorous gas and its effects on the cardiovascular and nervous systems.
Hydrogen sulfide activates a gene linked to longevity in a way similar to resveratrol, an antioxidant in red wine that GlaxoSmithKline PLC tried to turn into a drug, scientists found. Unlike resveratrol, hydrogen sulfide is made by the body. Pills that boost levels of the compound may one day prolong life.
“Everyone always thought of hydrogen sulfide as the bad guy — an environmental pollutant, a toxin,” said Matt Whiteman, associate professor of experimental therapeutics at England’s University of Exeter. Since the discovery that the gas is made in mammalian cells, “this research area has exploded,” he said.
Diets rich in onions, garlic and other allium plants are loaded with potential compounds that can release or generate hydrogen sulfide, Whiteman said. Still, there is no evidence yet that garlic’s health benefits are derived from hydrogen sulfide.
UK scientists worry vaccines may not protect against S.African coronavirus variant
https://news.trust.org/item/20210104140005-hnx99
Simon Clarke, an associate professor in cellular microbiology at the University of Reading, said that while both variants had some new features in common, the one found in South Africa "has a number additional mutations ... which are concerning".
He said these included more extensive alterations to a key part of the virus known as the spike protein - which the virus uses to infect human cells - and "may make the virus less susceptible to the immune response triggered by the vaccines".
Lawrence Young, a virologist and professor of molecular oncology at Warwick University, also noted that the South African variant has "multiple spike mutations".
"The accumulation of more spike mutations in the South African variant are more of a concern and could lead to some escape from immune protection," he said.
Scientists including BioNTech CEO Ugur Sahin and John Bell, Regius Professor of Medicine at the University of Oxford, have said they are testing the vaccines against the new variants and say they could make any required tweaks in around six weeks.
Vitamin D is not a cure nor is it 100% preventative. It may reduce the chance of infection, severity and recovery time from the studies I've read. Masks and social distancing are still advised. I'm 100% getting the vaccine as soon as it's available.
Bioqr posted about vitamin d3 studies recently
No vaccine needed here
I mentioned I've been taking Vitamin D for 20-30 yrs and never get colds or the flu. I believe it's because of Vitamin D. You won't take my word for it so I thought I'd overwhelm you with evidence. :)
I don't know if that's the type of evidence that will satisfy you but even though there's been no RCTs for D3, the evidence is pretty clear from patient records that there is a strong positive association between D3 levels and the severity and recovery time for COVID patients.
This whole thread started with my comment that correlation does not prove causation. That is true unless it can be shown directly.
Vitamin D and COVID 19: The Evidence for Prevention and Treatment of Coronavirus (SARS CoV 2)
Vitamin D is a steroid hormone than can go into the nucleus and make effective changes. Specifically the Vitamin D receptor is a member of the nuclear receptor/steroid hormone receptor superfamily. These receptors function as ligand-activating, transcriptional regulatory proteins.
Apparently current vaccines effective against new Covid strain as well as the old.
“It’s probably a good thing that we used the entire spike protein in our vaccines because what we’re getting is what we call a polyclonal response. We’re developing antibodies to many different regions of that protein, so even if one part of that protein were mutated and some antibodies no longer recognize it, there would be antibodies to other parts of that protein,” Gottlieb explained. Antibodies help fight infections. “So this probably will not slip past our vaccines very easily, but eventually we will have to update the vaccines.”
Belgium, Austria, Italy, Netherlands halt UK flights, fearing new coronavirus variant
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/12/20/belgians-dutch-austrians-halt-uk-flights-over-new-coronavirus-strain.html
The new strain of coronavirus was identified in southeastern England in September and has been circulating in the area since, a WHO official told the BBC on Sunday.
“What we understand is that it does have increased transmissibility, in terms of its ability to spread,” said Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO’s technical lead on COVID-19.
Studies are under way to better understand how fast it spreads and and whether “it’s related to the variant itself, or a combination of factors with behavior,” she said.
She said the strain had also been identified in Denmark, the Netherlands and Australia, where there was one case that did not spread further.
“The longer this virus spreads, the more opportunities it has to change,” she said. “So we really need to do everything we can right now to prevent spread, and minimizing that spread will reduce the chances of it changing.”
I provided links to CDC statistics and various studies with excerpts. I haven't seen one post of yours that cites a source.
Stop spouting nonsense and provide links to back up your claims or this conversation has ended.
Investors Are Holding Less and Less Cash. Why That’s a ‘Sell Signal.’
https://www.barrons.com/articles/investors-are-holding-less-cash-why-thats-a-sell-signal-51608065139
Flu vs COVID lethality...
Before COVID, for the flu we didn't wear masks, we didn't social distance, we didn't stop eating out, we didn't stop attending football games, tailgating, parties, concerts, we didn't stop travelling.
The actual confirmed flu deaths per year has been less than 16,000 / yr(see below) the last 6 flu seasons. Less than 50% of the U.S. population gets vaccinated for the flu each yr and the vaccine is historically less than 60% effective,
We're about 9 mos into the pandemic and by April 1, 2021 it's projected we will have suffered over 500,000 deaths. The best way to compare the lethality of influenza and COVID is to look at the number of deaths per 100K infections.
Flu vs COVID - deaths per 100K infections:
Flu: In the 2018-19 flu season it was estimated 35.5M flu infections and 34,200 deaths.
COVID: As of Dec 15 there are 16,519,688 infections and 302,922 deaths.
Deaths per 100K Infections:
Flu = 96.34
COVID = 1,834
COVID is 19X more deadly than the influenza based on these raw statistics.
It's estimated that 17% of COVID infections are asymptomatic according to meta-analysis. Although the total COVID infections statistic includes some asymptomatic cases, for this exercise I'll add the entire 17% to the total infections which brings it to 19.328,011. This reduces the ratio to 1,567 deaths per 100K infections which is still 16.25X more deadly than influenza.
Estimating the extent of asymptomatic COVID-19 and its potential for community transmission: systematic review and meta-analysis
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.05.10.20097543v3
Diagnosis in all studies was confirmed using a RT-PCR test. The proportion of asymptomatic cases ranged from 4% to 41%. Meta-analysis (fixed effect) found that the proportion of asymptomatic cases was 17% (95% CI: 14% - 20%) overall;
Overall, an estimated 299,028 excess deaths occurred from late January through October 3, 2020, with 198,081 (66%) excess deaths attributed to COVID-19. The largest percentage increases were seen among adults aged 25–44 years and among Hispanic or Latino persons.
The 25,000 to 69,000 numbers that Trump cited do not represent counted flu deaths per year; they are estimates that the CDC produces by multiplying the number of flu death counts reported by various coefficients produced through complicated algorithms. These coefficients are based on assumptions of how many cases, hospitalizations, and deaths they believe went unreported. In the last six flu seasons, the CDC’s reported number of actual confirmed flu deaths—that is, counting flu deaths the way we are currently counting deaths from the coronavirus—has ranged from 3,448 to 15,620, which far lower than the numbers commonly repeated by public officials and even public health experts.
CDC estimates that influenza was associated with more than 35.5 million illnesses, more than 16.5 million medical visits, 490,600 hospitalizations, and 34,200 deaths during the 2018–2019 influenza season. This burden was similar to estimated burden during the 2012–2013 influenza season1.
Percent of adults aged 18 and over who received an influenza vaccination during the past 12 months: 46.8%
During seasons when the flu vaccine viruses are similar to circulating flu viruses, flu vaccine has been shown to reduce the risk of having to go to the doctor with flu by 40 percent to 60 percent.
if no one had wore a mask world wide, this past year, the death total, in the USA would be over a million. easily.
Gene Therapy Injection in One Eye Improves Vision in Both
https://www.technologynetworks.com/biopharma/news/gene-therapy-injection-in-one-eye-improves-vision-in-both-344027
In a landmark phase 3 clinical trial, the international team, coordinated by Dr Patrick Yu-Wai-Man from the University of Cambridge and Dr José-Alain Sahel from the University of Pittsburgh and Institut de la Vision, Paris, successfully treated 37 patients suffering from Leber hereditary optic neuropathy (LHON). Subject to further trials, the treatment could help thousands of people across the world to regain and retain some of their sight.
The study, published today in the journal Science Translational Medicine, indicates that 78% of treated patients experienced significant visual improvement in both eyes. It suggests that the improvement in vision in untreated eyes could be due to the transfer of viral vector DNA from the injected eye.
Right...so it will be interesting if McConnell's red line is a thick straight line or will it have some curves. I don't think Pelosi or the Dems will stand for deniers who harmed their employees not being held responsible.
Some businesses banned their employees from wearing masks. Should they be protected?
Mitch McConnell held up a stimulus deal for months over liability protections for businesses. Here are the biggest lobbyists and donors who've influenced his 'hard red line.'
https://www.businessinsider.com/mcconnell-stimulus-liability-protection-donors-lobbyists-2020-12
It's been a major sticking point that has held up coronavirus financial relief for months, even as the pandemic continues to wreak havoc on the economy and people's lives.
A powerful group of business organizations and organizations have pushed for the liability shields, and have donated generously to McConnell and other Republicans.
But even healthcare and educational groups, which tend to favor Democrats, are in on the push, letters and lobbying disclosure records show.
The National Grocers Association said if Congress fails to pass the liability protections then it "would feel like a big lump of coal on Christmas after they have done a year of yeoman's work feeding their communities."
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has been unwavering in his push for liability protections for companies and other organizations in a coronavirus relief bill, at least until just days ago.
It's been one of the key sticking points — and perhaps the most controversial one — that has made it nearly impossible for Congress to provide struggling Americans another round of economic relief from the coronavirus pandemic.
"My red line going forward on this bill is we need to provide protection, litigation protection, for those who have been on the front line," McConnell declared in late April during a Fox News interview. "That's the only way we're going to be able to get past this and that is to begin to open up the economy again.
"We have to have businesses brave enough to open up again and employees brave enough to go back to work."
He has argued that companies and other institutions such as colleges would be reluctant to reopen if they faced a slew of lawsuits from people claiming that a business was a source of their coronavirus infection.
Congress has not passed another stimulus since May, as lawmakers have continued to fight over the liability shields as well as the cost of the next relief, and Democrats' insistence that a bill includes aid for states and local governments.
Months later, as US coronavirus cases and deaths hit grim milestones, lawmakers still haven't resolved their differences. Those squabbles threaten Congress' latest last-ditch effort at a bipartisan stimulus package before the holidays.
Dozens of companies — including airlines and grocery stores, as well as education associations, for-profit groups, and healthcare organizations — are actively pushing for the liability shield, an Insider analysis of lobbying disclosure records from nearly 130 companies and interest groups shows.
There's a lot of money at stake. A deluge of suits could mean expensive legal settlements that would cut into company profits and even obliterate smaller businesses.
An Insider review of federal campaign finance and lobbying records show some of the largest companies and trade groups pushing for those protections donated heavily to Republicans, whose majority in the Senate is key to keeping McConnell in charge.
They include political action committees for meatpacking plants that were the center of widespread coronavirus outbreaks and pushed the White House early on to declare their businesses essential, as well as several Fortune 500 companies, and a for-profit hospital. Some of the companies, such as Tyson Foods and Smithfield Foods, have already faced coronavirus-related lawsuits.
But perhaps the most generous donations came from the powerful US Chamber of Commerce, which lobbies for big corporations and also on behalf of small businesses through state and local chapters.
The Chamber's employees and PAC contributed $484,425 to Republicans during the 2020 election, according to data compiled by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.
Of the total, which is more than usual for an election cycle, McConnell's campaign committee received $29,700. GOP Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, who cowrote the liability bill called the Safe to Work Act, received $10,000 from the Chamber's members, politically affiliated groups, and PACs.
The Chamber of Commerce has been among the most vocal proponents of liability protections. The nation's largest business group spends more on lobbying than any other organization. It spent $20 million during this year's third quarter alone, which runs from July until September. That's a roughly 63% jump from the almost $12.3 million the Chamber spent in lobbying during the same period in 2019.
While the Chamber has historically been aligned with Republicans, in the 2020 cycle its PAC shifted its longstanding GOP support by giving $152,250 in donations to various centrist Democrats.
Other business causes that lobbied for liability protections this year include the Business Roundtable, a rival lobbying group to the Chamber led by powerful corporate executives.
Two of the group's lobbyists contributed to the National Republican Senatorial Committee, which works to elect Republicans to the upper chamber, according to information from the Federal Election Commission.
Yet despite the Chamber and Roundtable's months-long push for liability protections, both organizations conceded on Monday, saying that Congress shouldn't delay fiscal relief anymore over the issue.
They want Congress to pass a $748 billion bipartisan relief bill that includes forgivable loans to small businesses and revisit liability protections next year.
That legislation — the product of negotiations by a group of lawmakers led by West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin — put aside the most contentious issues from a prior $908 billion framework into a separate bill to make the stimulus provisions they agree on easier to pass.
Likewise, McConnell is also recently shifting his position for the first time since declaring the "hard red line."
The Kentucky Republican said this week and last that he's now willing to pass a narrow relief bill and punt liability talks — if Democratic leaders drop their insistence on funding for states and local governments. Many Republicans oppose that funding, which they consider a bailout for states that have mismanaged their own budgets.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi initially indicated they would be unwilling to cave on the funding, although they're now also under significant pressure to come to a compromise just days before the winter holidays.
U.K. scientists find new COVID-19 variant w/key mutations in the spike protein...
New coronavirus strain spreading in UK has key mutations, scientists say
https://www.reuters.com/article/health-coronavirus-britain-variant/new-coronavirus-strain-spreading-in-uk-has-key-mutations-scientists-say-idUSKBN28P158
LONDON (Reuters) - British scientists are trying to establish whether the rapid spread in southern England of a new variant of the virus that causes COVID-19 is linked to key mutations they have detected in the strain, they said on Tuesday.
The mutations include changes to the important “spike” protein that the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus uses to infect human cells, a group of scientists tracking the genetics of the virus said, but it is not yet clear whether these are making it more infectious.
"Efforts are under way to confirm whether or not any of these mutations are contributing to increased transmission," the scientists, from the COVID-19 Genomics UK (COG-UK) Consortium, said in a statement (bit.ly/3mhpTJX).
The new variant, which UK scientists have named “VUI – 202012/01” includes a mutation in the viral genome region encoding the spike protein, which - in theory - could result in COVID-19 spreading more easily between people.
MAY reduce.. then you have to add on risk of bacterial pneumonia, possible oral health issues, and restriction of O2.
A "posssible" 6-15% reduction of something that 90% never get is statistically absurd.
There is absolutely no evidence that THIS COVID is any worse than influenza or prior COVIDS
The primary purpose of masks is to stop transmissions to others. RCT trials for prevention of infection of the mask wearer are next to impossible to run for a variety of reasons and have been of poor quality. It's estimated that 17% of COVID infections are asymptomatic according to meta-analysis.
Still...6-15% reduction in risk of infection to a mask wearer is nothing to sneeze at :)
Estimating the extent of asymptomatic COVID-19 and its potential for community transmission: systematic review and meta-analysis
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.05.10.20097543v3
Diagnosis in all studies was confirmed using a RT-PCR test. The proportion of asymptomatic cases ranged from 4% to 41%. Meta-analysis (fixed effect) found that the proportion of asymptomatic cases was 17% (95% CI: 14% - 20%) overall;
33 studies (12 randomised control trials (RCTs)) were included. Mask wearing reduced primary infection by 6% (odds ratio (OR):?0.94; 95%?CI:?0.75–1.19 for RCTs) to 61% (OR:?0.85; 95%?CI:?0.32–2.27; OR:?0.39; 95%?CI:?0.18–0.84 and OR:?0.61; 95%?CI:?0.45–0.85 for cohort, case–control and cross-sectional studies respectively). RCTs suggested lowest secondary attack rates when both well and ill household members wore masks (OR:?0.81; 95%?CI:?0.48–1.37). While RCTs might underestimate effects due to poor compliance and controls wearing masks, observational studies likely overestimate effects, as mask wearing might be associated with other risk-averse behaviours. GRADE was low or very low quality.
Conclusion
Wearing face masks may reduce primary respiratory infection risk, probably by 6–15%. It is important to balance evidence from RCTs and observational studies when their conclusions widely differ and both are at risk of significant bias. COVID-19-specific studies are required.
Am I wrong?
Overall, rates of AEs were lower in participants with baseline positive SARS-CoV-2 status compared with those with baseline negative SARS-CoV-2 status. The tables below provide an overview of the ratesof AEs by treatment groups and baseline SARS-CoV-2 status
Aeva is another Israeli co with lidar on a chip using FMCW. In November Aeva agreed to merge with the SPAC InterPrivate Acquisition Corp. The SPAC trades as IPV and will change to AEVA when it closes in 1Q 2021.
Aeva has a partnership with Porsche...
https://aeva.ai/investors/
Ex-Tesla Engineer Says Solid-State Batteries Are A 'False Hope'
https://insideevs.com/news/443450/ex-tesla-solid-state-batteries-false-hope/
REVIEW: The Mustang Mach-E is Ford's most important vehicle in decades — and one of the most exciting electric cars I've ever driven
https://www.businessinsider.com/review-ford-mustang-mach-e-electric-vehicle-2020-12
I started cutting back when I saw IBB was up 200% from the March low. The exuberance for bios is over the top IMO.
Chart...
https://www.tradingview.com/x/eXRGbte0/
edit - IBB is up 200% of the move from the Feb high to March low.
Interesting concept...
Gene editing has made pigs immune to a deadly epidemic
https://monkeyviral.com/gene-editing-has-made-pigs-immune-to-a-deadly-epidemic/
Now Christianson’s company, which is a division of the British animal genetics firm Genus, is trying something different. Instead of trying to seal animals off from the environment, it’s changing the pigs themselves. At an experimental facility in the central US (the location kept secret for security reasons), the company has a swine IVF center and a lab where pig eggs are being genetically edited using CRISPR, the revolutionary gene scissors.
During a virtual tour, a worker carried a smartphone through the editing lab into the gestation area, where sows spend nine months until giving birth—“farrowing” is the farmer’s term. Then he led the way to a concrete room where gene-edited piglets grunted and peered at the camera. According to the company, these young pigs are immune to PRRS because their bodies no longer contain the molecular receptor the virus docks with.
Every virus attacks cells by fusing with them and injecting its genetic cargo. With covid-19, the virus attaches to a receptor called ACE-2, which is common on airway and lung cells—the reason the disease causes problems with breathing. With PRRS, it’s CD163, a receptor on white blood cells. These experimental pigs don’t have a complete CD163 gene because part of it was snipped away with gene editing. No receptor, no infection.
According to the company’s unpublished research, attempts to infect the gene-edited pigs with PRRS have not succeeded. “I never thought it would be a light switch,” says Christianson. “But it seems to work on all types of pigs and against all the strains of the virus.”
Plieth's buyout...the "hot I/O target" is Ror1...
Boehringer Ingelheim to Acquire NBE-Therapeutics for EUR 1.18 Billion, Significantly Enhancing Its Cancer Pipeline Portfolio with Novel Antibody-Drug Conjugates
https://www.boehringer-ingelheim.com/press-release/agreement-acquire-nbe-therapeutics
About NBE-002
NBE-Therapeutics’ lead candidate, NBE-002, is an anti-ROR1 ADC. ROR1 is a receptor tyrosine kinase expressed in various hematologic and solid malignancies, including triple negative breast cancers and lung adenocarcinoma. The compound is currently in phase I clinical studies.
Not ALXO...
ALX Oncology Announces Pricing of Upsized Public Offering of Common Stock
https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2020/12/10/2142708/0/en/ALX-Oncology-Announces-Pricing-of-Upsized-Public-Offering-of-Common-Stock.html
BURLINGAME, Calif., Dec. 09, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- ALX Oncology Holdings Inc. (“ALX Oncology”) (Nasdaq: ALXO), a clinical-stage immuno-oncology company developing therapies to block the CD47 checkpoint pathway, today announced the pricing of an upsized underwritten public offering of 2,380,000 shares of its common stock at a price of $76.00 per share.
ALXO is the prime suspect...
Word reaches me of another biotech takeover involving a hot new I-O target. Stay tuned for news tomorrow.
— Jacob Plieth (@JacobPlieth) December 9, 2020