Info Magzine: Pfizer asks FDA to OK its vaccine for kids ages 12-15

Pfizer and its German collaborator BioNTech on Friday requested for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to permit their COVID-19 vaccine to be used on adolescents ages 12-15. Their vaccine is already approved for these 16 and up.

The corporations additionally plan to ask for related authorization from regulatory businesses in different components of the world. In trial results released recently, the businesses confirmed that their vaccine prevented all COVID-19 symptomatic illness in trial contributors ages 12-15, generated giant numbers of protecting antibodies in that age group, and didn’t pose any security issues.

The corporations will observe all the greater than 2,200 trial contributors for two years after their second dose to guarantee security and vaccine sturdiness.

– Karen Weintraub

Also within the information:

►Nashville will no longer require face masks to be worn in outdoor settings, metropolis officers introduced Friday. Mask necessities will proceed in indoor settings. The well being division additionally advisable that individuals proceed to put on masks in each indoor and outside settings the place social distancing isn’t an choice.

►Duke University would require all new and returning college students to current proof of COVID-19 vaccination to pupil well being officers earlier than they’ll enroll for the autumn semester, joining a growing list that includes Notre Dame, Cornell and Rutgers.

►Coney Island’s famed amusement parks reopened Friday after the coronavirus pandemic shuttered New York City’s iconic summer season playground all final 12 months. After 529 days of closure, “it’s a very emotional day. We wanted to spread positivity,” Alessandro Zamperla, the president of the corporate that owns one of many Island’s amusement parks, mentioned at a gap ceremony.

►Participants on this 12 months’s Boston Marathon could also be required to present proof of up to two adverse COVID-19 assessments earlier than the race, even when they’ve been vaccinated, the Boston Athletic Association mentioned Wednesday. The race has been postponed till October, as an alternative of its conventional April date, due to the pandemic.

►Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer is looking on the state’s excessive faculties to supply distant schooling for two weeks after spring break, youth sports activities to pause all actions for two weeks and other people to keep away from consuming indoors at eating places for the identical period of time. She burdened this can be a request, not a mandate. But she mentioned individuals taking motion on their very own is the one manner Michigan can curb a huge rise in COVID-19 cases in the state.

►The 7-day common for COVID-19 circumstances and hospitalization have elevated 2% and seven%, respectively, from the earlier interval. The White House COVID-19 response workforce reported Friday that averages presently stand at greater than 64,000 circumstances and 5,300 new admissions.

►The Biden administration introduced Friday that two new mass vaccination websites might be arrange in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

►Racism is a “serious public health threat,” CDC director Rochelle Walensky declared Thursday. This comes as communities of coloration face disproportionate COVID-19 case counts and demise, shining gentle on “inequities that have existed for generations,” the company mentioned in an announcement.

►A lady in Kyoto, Japan, who suffered extreme lung harm after contracting the virus turned the primary recovered COVID-19 affected person on the planet to obtain a lung transplant from residing donors. She was donated lung tissue from her husband and son.

►The state of Florida has filed a lawsuit in opposition to the federal authorities to demand cruise ships start sailing.

📈 Today’s numbers: The U.S. has greater than 31 million confirmed coronavirus circumstances and 560,900 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University data. The international totals: More than 134.3 million circumstances and greater than 2.9 million deaths. More than 229 million vaccine doses have been distributed within the U.S. and 174 million have been administered, according to the CDC.

📘 What we’re studying: California Latinos of all age teams are “multiple” instances extra seemingly to die from COVID-19 than white individuals, a UCLA research finds. Read the full story .

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Johnson & Johnson dose allocation to fall 85% subsequent week

The allocation of Johnson & Johnson vaccine doses from the U.S. authorities is predicted to fall by 85% subsequent week, in accordance to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Only about 785,000 Johnson & Johnson vaccine doses are slated to roll out to states and other jurisdictions subsequent week, in contrast to 5 million doses this week.

The decline in provide comes after the corporate had to discard 15 million doses of its coronavirus vaccine final month at its Baltimore facility as a result of the batch didn’t meet high quality requirements.

The firm expects “relatively low level of weekly dose delivery” till its manufacturing facility in Baltimore is allowed by the FDA, the duty power’s coordinator Jeff Zients introduced. He didn’t give a timeline, however mentioned as soon as the ability is allowed, the corporate expects to ship 8 million doses weekly by the top of the month.

Meanwhile, greater than a 3rd of Americans have gotten a minimum of one shot, and greater than 1 / 4 of American adults at the moment are absolutely vaccinated, knowledge launched via the CDC reveals. About one-fifth of all Americans have been absolutely vaccinated.

But with a rise in new circumstances and hospitalizations, Zients warned Friday that “all of us need to keep up our guard.”

North Carolina websites halt Johnson & Johnson photographs after hostile reactions

North Carolina well being officers mentioned on Thursday that they stopped administering Johnson & Johnson doses at a mass vaccination web site in Raleigh and at clinics in Hillsborough and Chapel Hill after a minimum of 26 individuals skilled hostile reactions, together with fainting.

Four individuals have been taken to hospitals for additional examination, and state and federal well being officers are reviewing the matter. In Colorado on Wednesday, 11 individuals noticed hostile reactions after receiving a J&J shot. Two of these people have been taken to a hospital.

CDC spokeswoman Kristen Nordlund mentioned it’s conscious of hostile reactions in some individuals who acquired the vaccine photographs in Iowa, Colorado, Georgia and North Carolina. Those reactions embrace dizziness, gentle headedness, feeling faint and fast respiratory.

“COVID-19 vaccines are safe and effective,” she mentioned. “Many people don’t have any side effects after COVID-19 vaccines, but some people will have pain or swelling at the injection site or fever, chills, or a headache. These typically don’t last long and are signs that your body is building protection.”

Couple of their 90s reunite after greater than a 12 months to rejoice their 72nd anniversary

Virginia Byrne, 95, spent greater than a 12 months aside from her husband Jack, 94, due to coronavirus restrictions as he lives in a reminiscence care facility.

The couple reunited March 19 on the assisted residing facility the place Jack resides in St. Louis, Missouri to rejoice their 72nd anniversary.

“The lights went on again in my life, because I was able to be so close to my husband for the first time in more than a year,” Virginia Byrne informed ABC. “It was a wonderful moment. I could hardly let go.”

Variant cases more than triple in some states

The CDC reported nearly 3,400 coronavirus variant cases late Thursday, showing some states had more than tripled their tallies of dangerous mutated viruses just in the last week.

The United States now has 20,412 known variant cases and seven states, including Georgia, Colorado and California, have reported at least 1,000 cases. A week ago, only two states had reached that mark. Seven states have now reported at least 1,000 cases; a week ago, only two had reached that mark.

Meanwhile, Michigan and Minnesota each reported more than 600 variant cases on Thursday, with Minnesota nearly tripling its known variant case count this week alone, and Michigan up 83% in the week.

– Mike Stucka

1 in 3 COVID-19 survivors diagnosed with brain or mental health disorder study finds

A massive study conducted during the pandemic estimates 1 in 3 COVID-19 survivors were diagnosed with a neurological or psychiatric condition within six months of infection.

The study, published Tuesday in the peer-reviewed journal The Lancet Psychiatry, used more than 230,000 electronic health records of COVID-19 patients mostly in the U.S. looking at 14 different brain and mental health disorders.

Thirty-four percent of survivors were diagnosed with at least one of these conditions, with 13% of these people being their first recorded neurological or psychiatric diagnosis. Mental health diagnoses were most common among patients, with 17% diagnosed with anxiety and 14% diagnosed with a mood disorder.

Although neurological diagnoses were more uncommon, they were more prevalent in patients who had been seriously ill during a COVID-19 infection. For example, 7% of patients who were admitted to intensive care had a stroke and 2% were diagnosed with dementia.

– Adrianna Rodriguez

If UK is any sign, vaccines may blunt impact of spring surge in US

Wednesday’s announcement by the CDC that the highly transmissible coronavirus variant first identified in Britain is now the dominant strain in the U.S. carries ominous implications, but recent developments in the United Kingdom offer a ray of hope.

Researchers at Imperial College London found that COVID-19 infections dropped about 60% in March as national lockdown measures slowed the spread of the virus. People 65 and older were least likely to be infected as they benefited most from the vaccination program, which initially focused on older people.

The study also found that the relationship between infections and deaths is diverging, “suggesting that infections may have resulted in fewer hospitalizations and deaths since the start of widespread vaccination.”

In the U.S., even though infections have increased by 14% over the last two weeks, the rate of hospitalizations is only up 5% and reported deaths – which typically lag by about four weeks – are down 31%, according to the New York Times tracker.

The U.S. trails only Britain among large countries in the number of vaccine doses administered per 100 people, 55-51. By comparison, France is at a little under 19. The U.S. has also given at least one vaccine shot to 75% of its population age 65 and older, which is most vulnerable to the virus.

That suggests the spring surge so many health experts are dreading won’t be as brutal as the one in the winter, which was capped by a record 95,000-plus deaths in January.

“It’s virtually a race between getting individuals vaccinated and this surge that appears to need to improve,” presidential adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci informed CNN on Wednesday.

Contributing: The Associated Press