Junior Digest

July 25,2020:The phase-I human clinical trial of India’s first indigenously-developed vaccine against novel coronavirus, Covaxin, began at the AIIMS here on Friday with the first dose of the injection given to a man, who is in his 30s.

Already, over 3,500 volunteers have registered themselves for the trial at AIIMS since last Saturday, of whom the screening of at least 22 people is underway, said Dr Sanjay Rai, Professor at theCentre for Community Medicine at AIIMS and the principal investigator of the study.

“The first volunteer, a resident of Delhi, was screened two days ago and all his health parameters were found to be within the normal range. He also does not have any co-morbid conditions.

“The first dose of 0.5 ml intramuscular injection was given to him around 1.30 pm. No immediate side-effects have been observed so far. He was under observation for two hours and will be monitored for the next seven days,” Rai said.

Few more participants would be given the vaccine on Saturday after their screening reports come.

AIIMS-Delhi is among the 12 sites selected by the Indian Council for Medical Research (ICMR) for conducting phase I and II randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trials of Covaxin.

In phase I, the vaccine would be tested on 375 volunteers and the maximum of 100 of them would be from AIIMS.

The second phase would include around 750 volunteers from all 12 sites together, Rai said.

Phase I of the vaccine trial will be done on healthy people aged 18-55 years having no co-morbid conditions. Women with no pregnancy will also be selected to be a part of the trial in the first phase.

In the second phase, 750 people will be recruited between 12-65 years, AIIMS Director Dr Randeep Guleria had said.

Already, around 1,800 volunteers have registered themselves for the trial at AIIMS, he had said.

“In the first phase we see the safety of the vaccine which is of primary importance and the dose range is also calculated,” he said.

There are three formulations of the vaccine, and each subject will be given any one of the formulation in two doses two weeks apart.The first 50 will get the lowest strength dose of the vaccine. If it is found to be safe in them, then it will be given to another 50 patients in high doses, acording to Rai.

COVID-19 vaccine candidate Covaxin, developed by the Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech in collaboration with the ICMR and the National Institute of Virology (NIV), had recently got the nod for human clinical trials from the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI)

New Delhi, Jul03 ,2020: Stressing on early hospitalization of the Covid 19 patients to reduce the mortality rate, Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Thursday said that more testing of those suspected of this disease must be done to reduce infection rate in the NCR region.
Chairing a review meeting with Chief Ministers of Delhi, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh for a unified strategy for COVID19 in the National Capital Region (NCR) today, he further said that adoption of testing via Rapid Antigen Test Kits will help in reducing infection transmission rate below 10 percent as suggested by World Health Organization and nearly 90 percent of screening can possibly be done through these kits.
He also assured the UP and Haryana CMs that Rapid Antigen Test Kits can be provided to them as much as they want.
While emphasising on wide use of Arogya Setu and Itihas Apps to help COVID19 mapping in the NCR, Mr Shah also said that the AIIMS Delhi Telemedicine consultation model being used in Delhi for COVID patients should be replicated in Uttar Pradesh and Haryana also.
“UP and Haryana can join AIIMS-Telemedicine COVID consultation through which patients can get advice by expert doctors. The training for doctors in small hospitals in UP and Haryana can be provided by AIIMS with the help of Tele-videography”, he said.

NITI Aayog Member Dr VK Paul, also gave a presentation on the strategy of tackling COVID19 in NCR. He provided details of best practices adopted in Delhi-NCR and the way ahead.

Union Minister for Health and Family Welfare Dr Harshvardhan, the UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and senior officials of Centre and states were also present in the meeting.

July 09,2020: Scientists warned on Wednesday of a potential wave of coronavirus-related brain damage as new evidence suggested COVID-19 can lead to severe neurological complications, including inflammation, psychosis and delirium.

A study by researchers at University College London (UCL)described 43 cases of patients with COVID-19 who suffered either temporary brain dysfunction, strokes, nerve damage or other serious brain effects.

The research adds to recent studies which also found the disease can damage the brain.

“Whether we will see an epidemic on a large scale of brain damage linked to the pandemic – perhaps similar to the encephalitis lethargica outbreak in the 1920s and 1930s after the 1918 influenza pandemic – remains to be seen,” said Michael Zandi, from UCL’s Institute of Neurology, who co-led the study.

COVID-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus, is largely a respiratory illness that affects the lungs, but neuroscientists and specialist brain doctors say emerging evidence of its impact on the brain is concerning.

“My worry is that we have millions of people with COVID-19 now. And if in a year’s time we have 10 million recovered people, and those people have cognitive deficits … then that’s going to affect their ability to work and their ability to go about activities of daily living,” Adrian Owen, a neuroscientist at Western University in Canada, told Reuters in an interview.

In the UCL study, published in the journal Brain, nine patients who had brain inflammation were diagnosed with a rare condition called acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (ADEM) which is more usually seen in children and can be triggered by viral infections.
The team said it would normally see about one adult patient with ADEM per month at their specialist London clinic, but this had risen to at least one a week during the study period, something they described as “a concerning increase”.

“Given that the disease has only been around for a matter of months, we might not yet know what long-term damage COVID-19 can cause,” said Ross Paterson, who co-led the study. “Doctors need to be aware of possible neurological effects, as early diagnosis can improve patient outcomes.”

Owen said the emerging evidence underlined the need for large, detailed studies and global data collection to assess how common such neurological and psychiatric complications were.

He is running a international research project at covidbrainstudy.com where patients can sign up to complete a series of cognitive tests to see whether their brain functions have altered since getting COVID-19.
“This disease is affecting an enormous number of people,” Owen said. “That’s why it’s so important to collect this information now.”

New Delhi, Jun 21,2020: The country’s coronavirus contagion tally on Sunday surged above 4 lakh with a record breaking single day spike of 15,413 fresh cases.
According to the Health Ministry update, the confirmed cases of the pandemic at present stand at 410461 across the nation, while the fatalities mounted to 13,254 after 306 people lost their lives fighting the lethal virus in the past 24 hours.
However, on a brighter side, as many as 2,27,755 patients were cured and discharged cases and it is 58,304 more than the active cases in the country that stands at 1,69,451 across the country.
With the recovered cases count margin increasing as compared to the active cases, indicates improvement of the recovery rate in the country as the recovery rate had improved to 54.12 per cent till Saturday, as per the Union Health Ministry.
Meanwhile, the condition of Delhi Health Minister Satyendra Jain, who was tested positive for COVID-19 earlier this week has been administered plasma therapy and is on oxygen support, the AAP stated on Saturday.

TOKYO,July 22,2020: Japan’s health ministry has approved dexamethasone, a cheap and widely used steroid, as a second treatment of COVID-19 after a trial in Britain showed the drug reduced death rates in hospitalised patients.

The ministry included dexamethasone as an option for treatment along with Gilead Sciences Inc’s antiviral drug remdesivir in a recent revision to its handbook. The revision was widely reported by Japanese media on Wednesday.
In results announced last month, a trial by researchers in the United Kingdom showed dexamethasone as the first drug to save lives of COVID-19 patients in what scientists said was a major breakthrough in the coronavirus pandemic.

The full results of the large randomised clinical trial released last Friday in the New England Journal of Medicine confirmed the benefits for people with advanced or moderate disease.

July 15,2020: The first vaccine against COVID-19 tested in the United States is moving into its final phase with promising results, according to results published Tuesday in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Moderna Inc. in collaboration with the National Institutes of Health started working together and within six weeks had a vaccine called mRNA-1273, said Dr. Nadine Rouphael, one of the authors on the study.

“To be able to publish preliminary results three months later is really unprecedented,” Rouphael said. “It had shown that the vaccine was well tolerated. It has also shown that the vaccine is able to induce a good immune response.”

It is the first vaccine to be tested in the United States, and Emory University is one of three sites for the trial that began March 16.

“These interim results are very encouraging,” said Evan Anderson, the principal investigator for the trial at Emory.

Patients with COVID-19 from Emory University Hospital and Emory University Hospital Midtown started developing “virus-neutralizing” antibodies within six days of testing positive, GPB News previously reported.
Emory’s study consisted of 45 healthy adults, 18 to 55 years of age, who received two vaccinations, 28 days apart, with mRNA-1273 in a dose of 25 μg, 100 μg, or 250 μg. There were 15 participants in each dose group. Three participants did not receive the second vaccination.

One of those participants, 65-year-old Norman Hulme, compared it to a flu shot.

“They wanted to observe me for the next hour just to make sure that there wasn’t some instant reaction or a bad side effect,” Hulme said.

It didn’t hurt and he didn’t notice anything remarkable afterward.
The vaccine did not produce serious side effects, Rouphael said.

“Side effects included pain at injection site and fatigue, some chills and headaches,” she said.

The effects were more common with the larger dose, which is not being pursued.

In the study, researchers looked at antibodies against the receptor-binding domain, part of the spike protein on the outside of the virus.
The RBD is what grips on to human cells and allows the virus to enter them. The researchers focused on antibodies against the RBD because the sequence of the RBD in SARS-CoV-2 distinguishes it from other coronaviruses that cause the common cold.

Rouphael said Phase 3 of the trial will seek to answer the question of whether the vaccine will protect against acquisition of COVID-19.

“We don’t know what the other components of the immune system could also be protective in addition to that antibody, for example, like the T-cell response,” Rouphael said. “A lot remains to be understood about the disease and how somebody who gets exposed actually acquired the infection, and if they do acquire the infection, how severe is.”

A 30,000-person study is set to begin July 27 to prove whether the shots are strong enough to protect against the coronavirus. It will mark the world’s largest study of a potential COVID-19 vaccine so far, according to the Associated Press.

The NIH-developed shot isn’t the only one set for such massive U.S. testing. The government plans similar large studies of the Oxford candidate and another by Johnson & Johnson; separately, Pfizer Inc. is planning its own huge study.

Already, people can start signing up to volunteer for the different studies.

Jun 28,2020:The Madhya Pradesh government will launch a ‘Kill Corona’ campaign from July 1 to control the spread of coronavirus in the State.

Under the campaign, door-to-door survey will be conducted and tests would also be done on citizens for other diseases, Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan said during a virtual review meeting on the COVID-19 pandemic on Saturday.

Mr. Chouhan said during the 15-day campaign, 2.5 lakh tests will be carried out and 15,000 to 20,000 samples would be collected daily, according to a press release.
He said the testing capacity will be doubled from 4,000 per 10 lakh people to 8,000 per 10 lakh people.

California , June 23 ,2020: US-based biopharmaceutical major Gilead Sciences will soon start clinical trials for inhaled formulation of its anti-viral drug remdesivir used for the treatment of Covid-19.
“After receiving the green light from the Food and Drug Administration to move forward, Gilead is about to start trials of an inhaled version of remdesivir,” said Chairman and CEO Daniel O’Day.
“We will screen healthy volunteers for phase one trials this week and hope to begin studies in patients with Covid-19 in August. If the trials are successful, this could represent important progress,” he said in a message posted on the company’s website.
Remdesivir, the investigational anti-viral medicine, is currently given to patients intravenously through daily infusions in the hospital. An inhaled formulation will be given through a nebuliser which could potentially allow for easier administration outside the hospital at earlier stages of disease.

O’Day said as part of the aim to benefit as many patients as possible, Gilead Sciences is focused on ensuring sufficient supplies of remdesivir and enabling access.
“We now expect to have more than two million remdesivir treatment courses manufactured by the end of the year and many millions more by 2021. Our scientists will stay focused on optimising the manufacturing process, and we will continue to collaborate globally to ensure sufficient worldwide supply.”
Remdesivir is an anti-viral product that is being studied in multiple ongoing international clinical trials. It has not been approved by the US FDA for any use.
In the United States, the FDA granted remdesivir an emergency use authorisation for the treatment of hospitalised patients with severe Covid-19. This authorisation is temporary and may be revoked, and does not take the place of the formal new drug application submission, review and approval process.

Geneva [Switzerland], July 8 ,2020:: The World Health Organisation (WHO) has confirmed that there is an “emerging evidence” of airborne transmission of the coronavirus, CNN reported.
The confirmation came after the publication of a letter on Monday signed by 239 scientists urging the agency to be more forthcoming about the likelihood that people can catch the virus from droplets floating in the air.
“We acknowledge that there is emerging evidence in this field, as in all other fields regarding the COVID-19 virus and pandemic and therefore, we believe that we have to be open to this evidence and understand its implications regarding the modes of transmission and also regarding the precautions that need to be taken,” Dr Benedetta Alleganzi, WHO Technical Lead for Infection Prevention and Control was quoted as saying.
Infectious disease epidemiologist Maria Van Kerkove, with WHO’s Health Emergencies Program, said, “We have been talking about the possibility of airborne transmission and aerosol transmission as one of the modes of transmission of Covid-19, as well as droplet. We have looked at fomites. We’ve looked at fecal-oral. We have looked at mother to child. We’ve looked at animal to human, of course as well.”
Alleganzi added that more research still needs to be done on the COVID-19 transmission.
“So, these are fields of research that are really growing and for which there is some evidence emerging but is not definitive,” she said.
“And therefore, the possibility of airborne transmission in public settings, especially in very specific conditions like crowded, closed, poorly ventilated settings that have been described cannot be ruled out. However, the evidence needs to be gathered and interpreted,” she added.

Hyderabad (Telangana), June 30,2020: Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech announced that it has successfully developed Covaxin, India’s first vaccine candidate for Covid-19, in collaboration with the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and National Institute of Virology (NIV).
The Drug Controller General of India – CDSCO, Ministry of Health & Family Welfare granted permission to initiate Phase I & II Human clinical trials after the company submitted results generated from preclinical studies, demonstrating safety and immune response. Human clinical trials are scheduled to start across India in July 2020.
The SARS-CoV-2 strain was isolated in NIV, Pune and transferred to Bharat Biotech.
The indigenous, inactivated vaccine developed and manufactured in the company’s Bio-Safety Level 3 (BSL-3) High Containment facility located in Genome Valley, Hyderabad.
Announcing the vaccine development milestone, Dr Krishna Ella, Chairman and Managing Director said: “We are proud to announce COVAXIN, India’s first indigenous vaccine against COVID-19. The collaboration with ICMR and NIV was instrumental in the development of this vaccine.”
Dr Ella added, “The proactive support and guidance from CDSCO has enabled approvals to this project. Our R&D and Manufacturing teams worked tirelessly to deploy our proprietary technologies towards this platform.”
Expedited through national regulatory protocols, the company accelerated its objective in completing the comprehensive pre-clinical studies. Results from these studies have been promising and show extensive safety and effective immune responses.
Speaking about Bharat Biotech’s prowess, Suchitra Ella, Joint Managing Director said, “Our ongoing research and expertise in forecasting epidemics has enabled us to successfully manufacture a vaccine for the H1N1 pandemic.”
“Continuing our focus on creating the only BSL-3 containment facilities for manufacturing and testing in India, Bharat Biotech is committed to advancing vaccine development as a matter of national importance to demonstrate India’s strength in handling future pandemics,” she added.
Bharat Biotech’s track record in developing vero cell culture platform technologies has been proven in several vaccines for Polio, Rabies, Rotavirus, Japanese Encephalitis, Chikungunya and Zika.

London , July 7,2020: Probiotics either taken alone or combined with prebiotics, may help to ease depression, suggests a review published in the journal BMJ Nutrition Prevention and Health.
But as per the researchers, whether they might help to lessen anxiety isn’t yet clear.
Foods that broaden the profile of helpful bacteria in the gut are collectively known as probiotics, while prebiotics are compounds that help these bacteria to flourish.
In the UK in 2016-17, 1.4 million people were referred with mental health issues, over half of them (53 per cent) had anxiety or stress-related disorders, while a third (33 per cent) had depression.
A two-way relationship exists between the brain and the digestive tract, known as the gut-brain axis. And the possibility that the microbiome — the range and number of bacteria resident in the gut — might help treat mental ill health has become a focus of interest in recent years.
To explore this further, the researchers searched for relevant studies published in English between 2003 and 2019, which looked at the potential therapeutic contribution of pre and probiotics in adults with depression and/or anxiety disorders.
Out of an initial haul of 71 studies, just seven met all the criteria for inclusion. All seven investigated at least one probiotic strain; four looked at the effect of combinations of multiple strains.
In all, 12 probiotic strains featured in the selected studies, primarily Lactobacillus acidophilus, Lactobacillus casei, and Bifidobacterium bifidium. One study looked at combined pre-probiotic treatment, while one looked at prebiotic therapy by itself.
The studies varied considerably in their design, methods used, and clinical considerations, but all of them concluded that probiotic supplements either alone or in combination with prebiotics may be linked to measurable reductions in depression.
And every study showed a significant fall or improvement in anxiety symptoms and/or clinically relevant changes in biochemical measures of anxiety and/or depression with probiotic or combined pre-probiotic use.
Of the 12 different probiotics investigated, 11 were potentially useful, the findings showed.
The researchers highlight several caveats to their review: none of the included studies lasted very long, and the number of participants in each was small.
This makes it difficult to draw any firm conclusions about the overall effects, whether they are long-lasting, and whether there might be any unwanted side effects associated with prolonged use, they say.
Nevertheless, on the basis of the preliminary evidence to date, pre and probiotic therapy warrant further investigation, they suggest.
Probiotics may help reduce the production of inflammatory chemicals, such as cytokines, as is the case in inflammatory bowel disease, suggest the researchers. Or they may help direct the action of tryptophan, a chemical thought to be important in the gut-brain axis in psychiatric disorders.
As anxiety disorders and depression affect people very differently, they require treatment approaches that take account of these complexities, they say. “In this way, with a better understanding of the mechanisms, probiotics may prove to be a useful tool across a wide range of conditions,” they write.
People with depression and/or anxiety disorders also often have other underlying conditions, such as impaired insulin production and irritable bowel syndrome, they point out.
“As such, the effect that probiotics have on patients with [common mental disorders] may be twofold: they may directly improve depression in line with the observed findings of this review, and/or they might beneficially impact a patient’s experience of their [common mental disorder] by alleviating additional comorbidities,” they write.
“Purely from the information gathered for this review, it is valid to suggest that, for patients with clinically recognised depression: isolate, or adjuvant prebiotic therapy is unlikely to affect an individual’s experience of their condition in a quantitatively evident way; and that isolate or adjuvant, probiotic/combined prebiotic-probiotic therapy may offer quantitatively measurable improvement in parameters relating to depression,” they conclude.
“However, there are inadequate data to suggest anything meaningful to support or refute the use of either pre/probiotic agents (or a combination of both) in patients with clinically recognised anxiety disorders; this would be a useful area to investigate further.”

New Delhi, July 12,2020: Stressing that Family Planning was a human rights issue, Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan on Saturday said commemorating World Population Day was important as it emphasised the importance of population stabilisation and its vital role in the future of the masses and their health as well as the importance of providing reproductive health services due to the challenges posed by Covid-19 pandemic.
Chairing the virtual meeting on the occasion of World Population Day here, in the presence of MoS Ashwini Kumar Choubey, Dr HHarsh Vardhan while highlighting the success of the Reproductive, Maternal, Newborn, Child and Adolescent Health (RMNCAH) programme, said the strategy of putting family planning at the core had helped to achieve remarkable results.
“In the last decade alone, our Crude Birth Rate (CBR) has reduced from 21.8 (SRS 2011) to 20 (SRS 2018) while the Total Fertility Rate (TFR) has declined from 2.4 (SRS 2011) to 2.2 (SRS 2018). And the teenage fertility has halved from 16 (NFHS III) to 7.9 (NFHS IV).”
He noted that these efforts had taken India closer to reaching the replacement fertility level of 2.1 and 25 out of 36 States/UTs have already achieved replacement level fertility.
Referring to Prime Minister’s commitment to Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, which transformed into a social movement, he urged everyone to make the population stabilisation mission an equally powerful people’s movement. He emphasised that Family Planning provides dignity to women, especially who are poor and marginalised. This needs to therefore be the cornerstone of our efforts for gender equality, maternal and child health, poverty alleviation and propagation of human rights.
Dr Harsh Vardhan also said that India is a fundamental part of the global FP2020 movement, “The Government of India has invested substantial domestic funding to achieve the ambitious FP2020 goals. The major initiatives under Family Planning include Mission Parivar Vikas, Injectable Contraceptive MPA, Family Planning – Logistics Management Information System (LMIS), Family Planning Communications Campaign. The National Family Planning Program has introduced the Injectable Contraceptive in the public health system under the “Antara” program. This contraceptive is highly effective and will meet the changing needs of couples and help women space their pregnancies.” “All this investment has paid us rich dividends in terms of averting nearly 5.5 crore unintended pregnancies, 1.1 crore total births, 18 lakh unsafe abortions and 30,000 maternal deaths as a result of contraceptive use in 2019 alone, as per Track 20 Estimates.”, he added.
Mr Choubey said, “Family planning not only keeps the population stable but also helps ensure good health for women, families and communities. Population stabilisation ensures that resources are available for the development of the maximum population. It is more important for India since at present, about 50 per cent of the country’s population falls in the reproductive age group of 15-49 years.”
The Health Minister also released the AB-HWC Mobile application developed by Ministry of Health and family Welfare. The App is designed to streamline the process of data reporting at AB-Health and Wellness Centres. It is an extension of AB-HWC Portal which is already used by state, district and AB-HWC facility in-charge to report data pertaining to service utilization at AB-HWCs to enable real time performance monitoring and act as a tool for planning. It shall provide real time information on the people who have been screened, dispensation of healthcare services and drugs, footfalls, and referrals made to PHCs.
Noting that Covid-19 has imposed additional responsibilities on the frontline healthcare workers, Dr Harsh Vardhan praised the HWCs for their tireless services towards Covid-19 and also to ensure that non-Covid essential services are not adversely affected

GENEVA/CHICAGO,July 6, 2020: The World Health Organization (WHO) is reviewing a report urging it to update guidance on the novel coronavirus after more than 200 scientists, in a letter to the health agency, outlined evidence the virus can spread in tiny airborne particles.
The WHO says SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, spreads primarily through small droplets expelled from the nose and mouth of an infected person that quickly sink to the ground.

But in an open letter to the Geneva-based agency, published on Monday in the Clinical Infectious Diseases journal, 239 scientists in 32 countries outlined evidence that they say shows floating virus particles can infect people who breathe them in.

Because those smaller particles can linger in the air, the scientists are urging WHO to update its guidance.

“We are aware of the article and are reviewing its contents with our technical experts,” WHO spokesman Tarik Jasarevic said on Monday in an email.
How frequently the coronavirus can spread by the airborne or aerosol route – as opposed to by larger droplets in coughs and sneezes – is not clear.

Any change in the WHO’s assessment of risk of transmission could affect its current advice on keeping 1-metre (3.3 feet) of physical distancing. Governments, which rely on the agency for guidance policy, may also have to adjust public health measures aimed at curbing the spread of the virus.

Although the WHO has said it is considering aerosols as a possible route of transmission, it has yet to be convinced that the evidence warrants a change in guidance.

Dr. Michael Osterholm, an infectious disease expert at the University of Minnesota, said the WHO has long been reluctant to acknowledge aerosol transmission of influenza, “in spite of compelling data,” and sees the current controversy as part of that simmering debate.

“I think the frustration level has finally boiled over with regard to the role that airborne transmission plays in diseases like influenza and SARS-CoV-2,” Osterholm said.
Professor Babak Javid, an infectious disease consultant at Cambridge University Hospitals, said airborne transmission of the virus is possible and even likely, but said evidence over how long the virus stays airborne is lacking.

If it can hang in the air for long periods of time, even after an infected person leaves that space, that could affect the measures healthcare workers and others take to protect themselves.

WHO guidance to health workers, dated June 29, says SARS-CoV-2 is primarily transmitted through respiratory droplets and on surfaces.

But airborne transmission is possible in some circumstances, such as when performing intubation and aerosol-generating procedures, the WHO says. They advise medical workers performing such procedures to wear heavy duty N95 respiratory masks and other protective equipment in an adequately ventilated room.

Dr. William Hanage, an epidemiologist at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, said the report under review at the WHO “makes many reasonable points about the evidence that this mode of transmission can happen, and they should be taken seriously.”

But how often airborne transmission happens, which is unknown, also matters.
“If airborne transmission is possible but rare, then eliminating it wouldn’t have a huge impact,” he said in emailed comments.

Officials at South Korea’s Centers for Disease Control said on Monday they were continuing to discuss various issues about COVID-19, including the possibility of airborne transmission. They said more investigations and evidence were needed.

New York, Jul 23,2020: The global confirmed COVID-19 cases has topped 15 million, reaching 15,008,046, according to the Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University.
A total of 617,902 people worldwide have died of the disease, the data showed on Wednesday.
The United States has suffered the most from the pandemic, with 3,919,550 cases and 142,350 fatalities, the tally showed.
Countries with more than 300,000 cases also include Brazil, India, Russia, South Africa, Peru, Mexico and Chile, according to the CSSE.

CHICAGO,11,2020: The coronavirus pandemic has exposed a clash among medical experts over disease transmission that stretches back nearly a century – to the very origins of germ theory.
The Geneva-based World Health Organization acknowledged this week that the novel coronavirus can spread through tiny droplets floating in the air, a nod to more than 200 experts in aerosol science who publicly complained that the U.N. agency had failed to warn the public about this risk.

Yet the WHO still insists on more definitive proof that the novel coronavirus, which causes the respiratory disease COVID-19, can be transmitted through the air, a trait that would put it on par with measles and tuberculosis and require even more stringent measures to contain its spread.

“WHO’s slow motion on this issue is unfortunately slowing the control of the pandemic,” said Jose Jimenez, a University of Colorado chemist who signed the public letter urging the agency to change its guidance.

Jimenez and other experts in aerosol transmission have said the WHO is holding too dearly to the notion that germs are spread primarily though contact with a contaminated person or object. That idea was a foundation of modern medicine, and explicitly rejected the obsolete miasma theory that originated in the Middle Ages postulating that poisonous, foul-smelling vapors made up of decaying matter caused diseases such as cholera and the Black Death.

“It’s part of the culture of medicine from the early 20th century. To accept something was airborne requires this very high level of proof,” said Dr. Donald Milton, a University of Maryland aerobiologist and a lead author of the open letter.

Such proof could involve studies in which laboratory animals become sickened by exposure to the virus in the air, or studies showing viable virus particles in air samples – a level of proof not required for other modes of transmission such as contact with contaminated surfaces, the letter’s signatories said.

For the WHO, such proof is necessary as it advises countries of every income and resource level to take more drastic measures against a pandemic that has killed more than 550,000 people globally, with more than 12 million confirmed infections.

For example, hospitals would have to provide more healthcare personnel with heavy-duty N95 respiratory masks – personal protective gear already in short supply – and businesses and schools would need to make improvements to ventilation systems and require wearing masks indoors at all times.

“It would affect our entire way of life. And that’s why it’s a very important question,” said Dr. John Conly, a University of Calgary infectious disease expert who is part of the WHO’s group of experts advising on coronavirus guidelines.

Conly said that so far the studies have not shown viable virus particles floating in the air.

“In my mind, I want to see evidence in those fine mists,” Conly said.
HOW FAR CAN A DROPLET TRAVEL?

The WHO’s latest guidance document, released on Thursday, called for more research on coronavirus aerosol transmission, which it said “has not been demonstrated.”

The agency also repeated a firm cutoff on the size of infectious droplets expelled in coughing and sneezing, noting that most larger droplets are unlikely to travel beyond one meter (3.3 feet) – the basis for their one-meter social distancing guidelines. Milton and others have said larger particles have been shown to spread much farther.

Conly and others maintain that if the virus were truly airborne like measles, there would already be many more cases.

“Would we not be seeing, like, literally billions of cases globally? That’s not the case,” Conly said.

WHO spokeswoman Dr. Margaret Harris rejected the claim by critics that the agency is biased against the idea of aerosol transmission, saying it recognized the possibility of airborne transmission during medical procedures from early on in the pandemic.
Harris said it is “quite possible” that aerosolization is a factor in some so-called super-spreading events in which one infected person infects many others in close quarters. Many of these events have occurred in places such as nightclubs where people are packed together and are not likely to be careful about protecting themselves or others from infection.

“Most super-spreading events have occurred in indoor places with poor ventilation, with crowding, where it’s very difficult for people to socially distance,” Harris said.

That is why, Harris said, the agency has called for urgent studies to figure out “what really happened in these clusters and what were the big factors.”

Barcelona [Spain], June 28 ,2020: Exposure to smoking (both maternal smoking during pregnancy and second-hand smoking during childhood), air pollution, as well as certain characteristics of the built environment may be associated with a higher development of obesity in children, according to a recent study.
The Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), a centre supported by the “la Caixa” Foundation, and the University of Southern California led the first major study to investigate the associations between many pollutants and environmental factors
The new study, which forms a part of the HELIX project and was published in Environmental Health Perspectives, used data on more than 1,300 children aged 6 to 11 years from birth cohort studies in six European countries: France, Greece, Lithuania, Norway, Spain, and the United Kingdom.
The authors used data on body mass index (BMI), waist circumference, skinfold thickness and body fat mass to determine the children’s overweight and obesity status. Blood and urine samples from the children and their mothers during pregnancy were also analysed.
In total, 77 pregnancy and 96 childhood exposures were assessed, including air pollutants, built environment, green spaces, smoking, and chemical pollutants (persistent organic pollutants, heavy metals, phthalates, phenols and pesticides).
ISGlobal researcher Martine Vrijheid, who coordinates the HELIX project and was the first author of the study, commented: “The prevalence of childhood obesity is increasing at alarming rates across the globe and may have increased even more than usual during the COVID-19 lockdown period.”
The findings of the study, which used data collected before anti-COVID-19 measures were introduced, were in line with global trends: the combined prevalence of overweight and obesity was 29% for the study population as a whole, with higher percentages for the cohorts from Spain (43 per cent) and Greece (37 per cent).
The results showed that exposure to smoking (both maternal smoking during pregnancy and second-hand smoking during childhood), air pollution (PM2.5 and PM10 particulate matter and nitrogen dioxide, indoor and outdoor) as well as certain characteristics of the built environment were associated with a higher childhood BMI. Differences in socioeconomic status did not explain these findings.
Associations with chemical pollutants were less consistent, with some chemicals measured in child blood (heavy metals copper and cesium) showing higher BMI, and others (persistent organic pollutants such as PCBs and DDE pesticides) showing lower BMI.
This may be explained by the fact that chemicals were measured at the same time as obesity in the children, and obesity status may have influenced chemical blood levels. A longitudinal follow-up of the cohort is needed to establish this.
“The children who live in densely populated areas and go to schools in areas with few services and facilities were more likely to be obese,” commented Leda Chatzi, Professor of Preventive Medicine at the University of Southern California and the last author of the study.
The relationship between obesity and the characteristics of the built environment “is in line with the findings of previous research and could be explained by a lack of opportunities for children to walk or engage in other outdoor physical activities,” she added.
“These findings provide further evidence that modifying environmental exposures early in life can limit the risk of obesity and associated complications,” commented Martine Vrijheid.
“The implications for public health are important since these results may help to identify obesity-related exposures that could be targeted for prevention and intervention early in life,” Vrijheid added.

Rio De Janeiro, Jul 7,2020: Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, in an interview with CNN Brazil, said he had the symptoms of the novel coronavirus.
Bosonaro, 65, has a temperature of 38 degrees Celsius and a blood oxygen level of 96 per cent. He has canceled meetings and is taking hydroxychloroquine, the TV channel said.
The World Health Organization (WHO) declared the outbreak of the new coronavirus a pandemic on March 11.
According to the WHO, the global coronavirus death toll has surpassed 532,000 people, with the number of cases worldwide exceeding 11.3 million.
Brazil’s Health Ministry has said the death toll from COVID-19 in the country increased by 620 over the past 24 hours to 65,487.
The case tally grew by 20,229 to 1,623,284, it said. A total of 927,292 people have recovered from COVID-19 since the disease outbreak start.

New Delhi,17,2020:The total confirmed COVID-19 positive cases in India crossed the one-million mark, nearly 170 days after the first case was registered on January 30 in Kerala. India now has the third highest number of confirmed cases, behind the U.S.’s close to 3.5 million and Brazil’s 1.97 million cases.

Despite the recovery rate being nearly 63.4%, India’s cumulative test positivity rate has now reached nearly 8% and is rising steadily, indicating that higher testing will continue to reveal more infections.
After U.S., India has done most COVID-19 tests: White House

After the U.S., which has carried out 42 million COVID-19 tests, India has done the second largest number of 12 million coronavirus tests, the White House said.

With regard to (the coronavirus) testing, we’ve done more than 42 million tests. The second-highest number is 12 million from India. We’re leading the world in testing, White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany told reporters at a news conference in Washington on July 16.

The White House was responding to questions related to the coronavirus pandemic in the U.S.