(I interrupt this bleakness for a dose of uplift: In Oregon, a 103-year-old, William Lapschies, caught the coronavirus in early March but recovered in time to celebrate his 104th birthday with pizza and chocolate cake on Wednesday. Happy 104th, Mr. Lapschies!)
More bad news: Case fatality rates have been creeping up, and lethality may be greater than many had expected. Germany was hailed for a death rate of only about 0.5 percent, and South Korea was not much higher; now both have case fatality rates well above 1 percent.
In models of the virus that my colleague Stuart A. Thompson and I published, we used a death rate of 1 percent. But if the South Korean death rate by age is applied to the demography of the United States, the American case fatality rate is about 2 percent, according to Dr. Christopher Murray, the director of the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation.
A great majority of the deaths in the United States will have been avoidable. South Korea and the United States had their first coronavirus cases on the same day, but Seoul did a far better job managing the response. The upshot: It has suffered only 174 coronavirus deaths, equivalent to 1,100 for a population the size of Americas.
That suggests that we may lose 90,000 Americans in this wave of infections because the United States did not manage the crisis as well as South Korea did. As of Friday night, the U.S. had already had more than 7,000 deaths.
Third, while we can bend the curve, it will bend back when we relax our social distancing.
This is more bad news, for many people seem to believe that once we get through this grim month or two, the nightmare will be over. But the virus is resilient, and health experts warn that this may be just the first wave of what may be many waves of infections until we get a vaccine sometime in 2021.
Already, Japan after initial success is seeing a surge of infections, while China and South Korea have struggled with imported infections; that seems inevitable as economies restart and travel resumes.
As the growth in the number of new coronavirus infections ebbed in some places, others prepared for what could be one of the worst weeks of the pandemic.
U.S. officials warned of a potential spike in COVID-19 deaths with the surgeon general warning, "This is going to be our Pearl Harbor moment, our 9/11 moment."
Hospitals expect to be overwhelmed as cases reach projected peaks, according to a federal report released Monday. Three out of four U.S. hospitals surveyed are already treating patients with confirmed or suspected COVID-19, according to a survey of 323 hospitals around the country by the inspector general at the Department of Health and Human Services.
(MORE: Deadly Cyclone Harold Hammers Vanuatu)
Problems such as insufficient tests, slow results, scarcity of protective gear, the shortage of breathing machines for seriously ill patients and burned-out staffs are feeding off each other, the watchdog agency found.
"There's this sort of domino effect," Ann Maxwell, an assistant inspector general at HHS, told the Associated Press. "These challenges play off each other and exacerbate the situation. There's a cascade effect."
"Hospitals anticipated being overwhelmed by a surge in COVID-19 patients, who would need specialty beds and isolation areas for effective treatment," the report said.
"Its likely that every hospital in America is going to have to deal with this," Maxwell said.
Worldwide, the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 topped 1.3 million, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. More than 73,000 people have died.
In the U.S., the number of deaths exceeded 10,500. The number of infections reached more than 356,000.
United States:
-South Carolina will join 43 other states in ordering residents to stay home, Gov. Henry McMaster announced Monday afternoon. Residents may leave their homes for work, to visit family members or for outdoor recreation.
-Public schools in Arkansas will remain closed for the rest of the school year, Gov. Asa Hutchinson announced Monday. Schoolwork will be completed online under the state's alternative methods of instruction program, according to KATV. At least 12 states and one U.S. territory have ordered or recommended school building closures for the rest of the academic year, according to Education Week.
-National grocery store chain Kroger said it will limit the number of customers who can be in a store at one time to half of the building's capacity to help with social distancing.
-Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers has stopped in-person voting on Tuesday amid coronavirus concerns, calling for suspending the statewide and local election until June 9, Politico reported. Evers had called state lawmakers back into session to postpone the election, but the Republican-controlled legislature declined to do so. Legislative leaders immediately challenged the governor's order in the state Supreme Court.
-New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said city officials may have to turn to "temporary burials" to deal with the strain placed on mortuary services and funeral homes by the number of deaths from the new coronavirus. De Blasio did not go into much detail saying only that COVID-19 victims could be buried where they could later be tracked and later moved for burial elsewhere. Gov. Andrew Cuomo told reporters Monday that he had not heard of such plans, according to the New York Times.
-New York, New Jersey and Detroit will see peaks in hospitalizations and COVID-19 deaths this week, Adm. Dr. Brett Giroir, assistant secretary for health at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, said Monday on NBC's Today show. Giroir explained that peak "reflects infections that occurred two or three weeks ago, and, "we may be seeing the worst upon us right now in terms of outcomes." Giroir said, "We'll see some rolling peaks across the country as the next few weeks unfold."
A Texas Department of Public Safety State Trooper directs traffic at a checkpoint in Orange, Texas, near the Louisiana state border, Monday, April 6, 2020. The troopers are checking motorists crossing the border between Louisiana and Texas on I-10 to determine if they need to self-quarantine for 14 days to comply with an executive order from Gov. Greg Abbott due to the COVID-19 outbreak.
-Texas Department of Public Safety State Troopers are staffing road checkpoints along the border to enforce Gov. Greg Abbotts executive order requiring visitors from neighboring Louisiana to self-quarantine for 14 days. Drivers coming in from Louisiana have to fill out a form designating a quarantine location in Texas.
-Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer warned Monday that her state is running dangerously low on personal protective equipment, also called PPE. "At Beaumont Hospital we have less than 3 days until N95 masks run out. At Henry Ford Health System we have less than four days. And at the Detroit Medical Center, less than 10 days," she said. Face shields will run out in three days and surgical gowns will run out in less than six days at all three of those health systems, she said.
-With about 61% of the crew of the USS Theodore Roosevelt tested, 173 members have tested positive for the coronavirus, CNN reported. About 2,000 people have been evacuated from the aircraft carrier.
-The Pentagon says the number of COVID-19 cases in the active duty force is 1,132 as of Monday morning. The total was 978 on Friday. There also have been 303 cases among members of the National Guard. Among the military services, the Navy has the most cases, with 431. That includes the infected crew members of the Theodore Roosevelt.
-A 4-year-old Malayan tiger named Nadia at the Bronx Zoo has tested positive for COVID-19 in what is believed to be the first known infection in an animal in the U.S. or a tiger anywhere, federal officials and the zoo said Sunday. Nadia and six other tigers and lions that have also fallen ill are thought to have been infected by a zoo employee who wasn't yet showing symptoms, the zoo said. All are doing well and expected to recover. The U.S. Department of Agriculture said there are no known cases of the virus in U.S. pets or livestock, and there doesn't appear to be any evidence that suggests animals can spread the virus to people.
-Pro golf officials announced a reconfigured 2020 schedule Monday. The Open Championship has been canceled for this year. It had been scheduled for July 16-19 at Royal St George's Golf Club in Sandwich, England. Instead, the 149th Open will be played at Sandwich in July 2021. The PGA Championship will be the year's first major on Aug. 6-9, at Harding Park in San Francisco. The U.S. Open will be Sept. 17-20. The Masters has been moved to Nov. 12-15.
Worldwide:
-Boris Johnson, prime minister of the United Kingdom, was taken to intensive care Monday evening after his condition worsened, a spokesman said. Johnson, 55, tested positive for COVID-19 10 days ago. On Sunday, he was admitted to St Thomas' Hospital in London with persistent symptoms of the coronavirus, including a high fever and cough. "Over the course of this afternoon, the condition of the prime minister has worsened and, on the advice of his medical team, he has been moved to the intensive care unit at the hospital," a statement from Johnson's office said. The spokesman said Johnson has asked Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab to deputize for him "where necessary," Sky News reported. Johnson remained conscious and was moved to intensive care as a precaution should he require ventilation, according to Sky News.
-Denmark's Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen announced that parts of Danish society will gradually begin to reopen on April 15 when children return to daycare centers, kindergarten and schools up to fifth grade, the Copenhagen Post reported. Other restrictions, such as closed borders and limiting gatherings to 10 people, have been extended until May 10. Bigger events remain banned until August.
-German Chancellor Angela Merkel said it's too early to talk about an end date for restrictive measures in place to fight the coronavirus. "We would be a bad government if we did not intensively, day and night, consider how we can take steps to return to ordinary life while still protecting health, but she added she would be considered "a bad chancellor, and wed be a bad government," if she set an immediate date to end restrictions.
-Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said he will declare a state of emergency for Tokyo and six other prefectures as early as Tuesday. Infections are soaring in the country that has the world's third-largest economy and its oldest population. He also announced details of a $989 billion economic stimulus package for the country.
-The daily number of deaths in Spain fell again Monday, marking the the fourth consecutive day. Mondays figure of 637 is the lowest recorded since March 24. Officials believe the virus may finally be peaking in Spain, which has the second-highest death toll in the world at 13,055. The latest figures show the country also registered 4,273 new confirmed cases, bringing the total to 135,032.
-Italy is also seeing the number of infections and deaths dropping. The pressure on northern Italys intensive care units has eased so much that Lombardy is no longer airlifting patients to other regions, The Associated Press reports. Italy's death toll is still the highest in the world at 16,523, after the Civil Protection agency announced 636 new deaths Monday. Italy also announced 3,599 new cases of the novel coronavirus on Monday, the lowest daily increase since March 17, bringing the total number of cases in the hard-hit country to 132,547.
-India is reconsidering a blanket export ban on the malaria drug hydroxychloroquine, which has been touted by President Donald Trump as a possible therapy for the coronavirus. Trump called Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday and asked him to release stocks of the drug.
Workers are seen outside a city building in Milwaukee, which set up drive-up early voting for the state's April 7 election in response to the coronavirus outbreak. Morry Gash/AP hide caption
Editor's note at 2:20 p.m. ET.: Citing public health concerns due to the coronavirus pandemic, Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers on Monday afternoon issued an executive order suspending in-person voting for Tuesday's statewide election. You can follow this developing story here.
Original story:
When it became clear that Wisconsin's April 7 election wasn't going to be postponed, Dean Kaufert turned to MacGyver, the star of a popular 1980s TV show, for inspiration.
"MacGyver always improvised things to make things work," he said.
Kaufert, who is mayor of Neenah, Wis., was part of a coalition of mayors who pushed hard for the election to be postponed as coronavirus infections spread in the state.
The mayors said it was going to be impossible for their local clerks to safely and effectively administer the election amid the pandemic.
But their pleas went nowhere. Federal lawsuits looking to delay the election failed and the Republican-controlled state legislature refused to make any changes to the election date or existing election laws.
An improvised divider aims to protect voters and poll workers from the coronavirus. Courtesy of Dean Kaufert hide caption
"Everyone was telling me, 'Dean, it's not going to happen. The election is going to move forward,' " Kaufert said. "I said, 'If that's the case, then we're going to do whatever we can to help protect the safety and health of our workers and my citizens.' "
Hence MacGyver. Kaufert asked a city maintenance worker to build Plexiglas barriers to put between poll workers and voters. Kaufert was inspired by screens he saw in his city's finance department, which had just been renovated.
"I sketched something out on paper and gave it to my maintenance guy and within six hours he had a prototype for me," he said.
By the next week, 26 clear shields were situated in front of poll workers helping people cast early ballots in the city of 25,000.
Voters check in using touchscreen electronic poll books. To reduce the risk of touching a potentially contaminated surface, Kaufert did some Googling and figured out how to make reusable writing utensils out of Q-tips and aluminum foil.
Then Kaufert tracked down the owners of an empty department store.
A former department store in Neenah, Wis., has been temporarily converted into a polling place to comply with social distancing guidelines. Courtesy of Dean Kaufert hide caption
A former department store in Neenah, Wis., has been temporarily converted into a polling place to comply with social distancing guidelines.
"And we're now holding the election in this 90,000-square-foot building with ample space, so everyone can follow the [social distancing] guidelines recommended by the CDC," he said.
Kaufert is particularly happy that the store has automatic doors, so no one will have to touch handles on the way in or out, and that the building has been vacant for several months, so there's no risk of it being contaminated with the virus by previous tenants.
Despite all of these efforts and relative success, Kaufert said he's still "mad as hell" that the election is happening as scheduled.
Many people in Wisconsin agree.
A shortage of 7,000 poll workers statewide
Thousands of poll workers in Wisconsin have been put in the unenviable position of deciding whether to do their job on Election Day or stay safe at home.
Daina Zemliauskas was scheduled to be a chief inspector at her polling place in Madison and said she was brought to tears by the decision.
"I feel guilty. I wanted to hold out," Zemliauskas said. "But, of course, the risk was just too great."
She spent three excruciating hours writing a resignation email to her city clerk. Zemliauskas said the response she got back was "terse," but she understands clerks are under incredible stress right now.
"I thought, why should I put myself, my family and my community at risk?" she said. "You know, this is just outrageous. It's madness."
Like the majority of Wisconsin poll workers, Zemliauskas is older than 60, putting her at higher risk of severe symptoms if she contracts COVID-19.
Last week, Wisconsin's elections agency used a state airplane to fly emergency supplies like isopropyl alcohol wipes, hand sanitizer and more than a million disposable pens to clerks across the state, in an attempt to shore up health and sanitation measures at polling places.
But Zemliauskas' fears and those of many others weren't assuaged by that effort.
According to the state elections agency, clerks are now dealing with a shortage of about 7,000 poll workers across the state.
As of last week, Neil Albrecht, the head of elections in Milwaukee, said he was operating with only 400 of his usual 1,400 election workers.
He said he doesn't blame his would-be staff for backing out.
"I come from a place of election worker and public safety first and foremost, and then of course access to voting, but at the end of the day we shouldn't be putting our election workers or the public at risk," he said.
Wisconsin's largest city normally has 180 polling places on Election Day, but Albrecht said on Tuesday it will be down to five for the entire city.
Advocacy groups warn of voter disenfranchisement
For weeks, Democratic Gov. Tony Evers has been urging people to vote by mail.
But by law, requesting a mail-in ballot in Wisconsin involves using a smartphone to upload a copy of a valid ID for voting, or having the technology to make a physical copy of the ID to send in the mail.
Many say these options are impossible for some voters, particularly senior citizens and low-income people.
"We've been taking literally hundreds, if not thousands, of phone calls per day from voters concerned about how they are going to vote," Albrecht said.
Mary Ellen Spiegelberg of West Allis called her local clerk several times attempting to request a mail-in ballot, but was having trouble with the technical requirements.
"I'm still using a Tracfone flip phone," Spiegelberg said. "I'm in the process of looking for a smartphone of one type or another, but I don't have that yet."
She said she's voted in "nearly every election for more than 70 years" and is determined to find a way to cast a ballot, even if it means risking public exposure on Election Day. She's looking into sewing face masks for herself and her husband.
"I still want to vote, and so does my husband," Spiegelberg said. "We are accustomed to voting in every election and this is an important one."
In Milwaukee, the Rev. Greg Lewis is also concerned that many of his neighbors won't be able to vote.
"It's already difficult trying to get people in my neighborhood to come out and vote because we don't think our vote really counts," said Lewis, who's president of Souls to the Polls, a group that works to mobilize black voters in Milwaukee.
Milwaukee's black community has been hit particularly hard by COVID-19. There have been several deaths. And Lewis himself has been diagnosed with the virus.
When the choice is between navigating the absentee ballot process or risking going to the polls in person, voting is going to be "practically impossible" for many in his community, he said.
"And that is so, so incredibly heartbreaking," Lewis said.
Legislative leaders refuse election changes
"We live in a republic, and we live in one that has to have elections," says state Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (center). Scott Bauer/AP hide caption
"We live in a republic, and we live in one that has to have elections," says state Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (center).
Wisconsin's election date is written into state law and only the Republican-controlled state legislature can postpone it.
For weeks, state Assembly Speaker Robin Vos and other Wisconsin GOP leaders have opposed making any changes to the election. They argue that it's too late to make it all-mail-in voting, because there isn't enough time to educate voters about the change.
They also point out that Wisconsin's spring election is not just a presidential primary; it's also a general election for hundreds of local offices, like mayor, county executive and county board. The winners of many of those races are scheduled to take office in April.
Vos says risking vacancies in local government positions isn't possible, especially during a pandemic.
"We live in a republic, and we live in one that has to have elections," he told reporters two weeks ago.
Vos and state Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald rebuffed the governor's call on Friday for a special session of the legislature over the weekend to act on proposals to shift the election to entirely by mail, and to delay deadlines for clerks' receipt and counting of ballots until May.
The governor had been pushing for an all-mail election for a while, but Friday was the first time he said it should be delayed until May.
The legislative leaders accused Evers of caving "under political pressures from national liberal special interest groups."
Vos says he plans to work at a polling place in his district on Election Day.
"I'm looking forward to the pride that I'm going to feel knowing that there were hopefully a million Wisconsinites who did the right thing and cast their ballot, whether by mail or in person, because democracy has to continue," he said.
A federal judge ruled last week that Wisconsin voters will have until April 13 to get their mail-in ballots to their local clerk, which means results won't be known until next week. But that's the least of most people's worries right now.
Research activity has ramped up in the US against COVID-19, with dozens of clinical trials underway or starting soon testing a range of potential treatment options.
An analysis of a federal database by Business Insider found a wide range of research activity varying by state. New York leads the nation with 11 coronavirus trials in the state.
Many trials are recruiting patients across the country, such as a study led by the National Institutes of Health to test remdesivir, an antiviral. That trial, for instance, is recruiting patients in more than a dozen states.
But 14 states still have no listed coronavirus trials, even as the virus has spread across the nation. Indiana and Nevada both have more than 1,000 confirmed COVID-19 cases but no clinical trials in their states to test experimental treatments.
The most widespread treatments being tested include the antiviral remdesivir, developed by Gilead Sciences, the anti-malaria pill hydroxychloroquine, and Kevzara, an anti-inflammatory arthritis drug developed by Sanofi and Regeneron.
Read more: Everything we know about remdesivir, hydroxychloroquine, and 4 other drugs being tested against the coronavirus
The first US coronavirus vaccine trial is also underway, testing healthy volunteers in Washington state and Georgia.
Business Insider conducted the analysis on April 3. Additional listings are being added daily to the database, which has grown from listing 19 US-based trials a week ago on March 27 to 44 studies.
Read more: There are more than 40 potential coronavirus vaccines in the works. Here are the top efforts to watch, including the 8 vaccines set to be tested in people this year.
The analysis is limited to the timeliness of the database. Federal law requires clinical trials to be posted no later than three weeks after a study starts enrolling patients, which could mean some studies aren't yet included. Most researchers post a listing on the site before they start recruiting participants.
Additionally, Business Insider went through the listings to remove trials that were either observational, meaning they are not testing any treatment option, or mentioned COVID-19 in the listing but were not actually focused on the disease. (For example, one study in the District of Columbia focused on high blood pressure was updated to state that it was delayed due to the COVID-19 outbreak.)
Read more: How to enroll in a clinical trial for a malaria drug that could help treat the coronavirus or stop you from catching it
SummerBLAST, the theaters summer education program, is also canceled. The Walnut Street Theater, meanwhile, has canceled The Best Man, Popcorn Falls, and Junie B. Jones, and notes on its website that it has temporarily suspended ticket sales for The Bodyguard, The Musical, which had been scheduled to run from May 12-July 12
A vaccine is the ultimate goal in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic, but its arrival is likely at least a year off, with that aggressive timeline being called a moonshot by one pharmaceutical company.
In the meantime, researchers are working to identify meaningful treatment options for patients with COVID-19, the deadly respiratory illness caused by the virus. And some early experiments and trials are encouraging.
For a much-needed dose of potential good news on the pandemic front, lets consider a handful of the many efforts underway to help COVID-19 patients.
Perhaps the best-known treatment being studied right now involves the anti-malaria drug hydroxychloroquine. President Donald Trump heralded it during a March 20 press conference. A few days later an Arizona man died after self-medicating with non-pharmaceutical chloroquine phosphate, leading the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to warn people not to take the substance to ward off coronavirus.
Despite this tragedy, hydroxychloroquine does indeed show promise in treating COVID-19, and doctors are already trying it out on patients.
Eight coronavirus patients at a veterans home in Lebanon, Oregon, for example, have been treated with hydroxychloroquine and the antibiotic azithromycin. The oldest of the patients, 104-year-old William Lapschies, appears to have fully recovered from the illness.
I was using it to give them a fighting chance, their doctor, Rob Richardson, told The Associated Press.
The Henry Ford Health System in Michigan announced last week that it is also treating some seriously ill COVID-19 patients with hydroxychloroquine.
Early indications are that the drug reduces viral shedding, which help arrest the progression of COVID-19 in patients who are experiencing shortness of breath or who have developed pneumonia.
We are not using it in outpatients, and were not using it in patients with mild infection, Henry Ford infectious-disease specialist Dr. Marcus Zervos told reporters. We are using it, however, in patients who are sick enough to be hospitalized with pneumonia who we feel are at risk of progressing their infection.
University of Minnesota infectious-disease scientist David Bouware has begun a nationwide trial to determine if hydroxychloroquine could prevent people exposed to the coronavirus from developing COVID-19. The trial will have 1,500 participants.
Bouware says he is encouraged by the data, which indicates the drug might keep the coronavirus from entering cells, but he points out its early days.
Our goal, he said, is to find out, Does this actually work?
Preventing the progression of COVID-19 once someone is infected with the coronavirus is a key objective of medical researchers. The reason: So far, a significant percentage of the patients who have had to be put on ventilators have died.
In hopes of fewer severe cases reaching that point, researchers in Belgium have launched a clinical trial of the drug Leukine.
The study will use Leukine to treat 80 Covid-19 patients who are suffering from respiratory distress but not on ventilation. The goal is to try to prevent them from going to intensive care, Partner Therapeutics chief medical officer Dr. Debasish Roychowdhury told The Oregonian/OregonLive. Massachusetts-based Partner Therapeutics owns the rights for Leukine.
Earlier studies have shown that the drug, a yeast-derived version of GM-CSF, promotes lung repair. GM-CSF, or granulocyte macrophage colony stimulating factor, is an important protein the body makes and is critical for maintaining normal, healthy lungs, Roychowdhury pointed out.
Leukine has been around for 30 years and is currently being used to aid leukemia- and- bone-marrow-transplant patients.
The safety of the drug is very well-known, Roychowdhury said.
One of the worst-case scenarios for a COVID-19 patient is cytokine storm, when the immune system overreacts to the novel virus and floods the lungs with immune cells, causing severe inflammation. One possible way to keep those patients alive is through transfusions of plasma with COVID-19 antibodies from people who have recovered from the illness.
Five COVID-19 patients with acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) at a hospital in Shenzhen, China, recently received such transfusions, a study posted to the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) reported on March 27.
Though the sample size is quite small (and the critically ill patients were receiving various treatments, including antiviral medications, as part of all-out efforts to save them), the results are encouraging. All five of the patients receiving the transfusions were on ventilation when the treatment began. Following plasma transfusion, body temperature normalized within 3 days in 4 of 5 patients, the study states. A month after the transfusion, three of the five patients had been released from the hospital and the other two were in stable condition.
In another small experiment, doctors treated seven COVID-19 patients with mesenchymal stem cells, which are known for their peculiar and powerful immunoregulatory abilities. This treatment also showed promise. The pulmonary function and symptoms of these seven patients were significantly improved in 2 days after MSC transplantation, stated a study published in the journal Aging and Disease. Among them, two common and one severe patient were recovered and discharged in 10 days after treatment -- significantly faster than is typical for both moderate and severe cases.
Another drug being studied in the fight against COVID-19 is the anti-viral Remdesivir, which was developed for Ebola.
Remdesivir might stop the coronavirus from reproducing in the body. Northwestern Memorial Hospital infectious-disease specialist Dr. Babafemi Taiwo has called it a really special drug.
These and other treatments are in the very earliest stages of study, seeing as the novel coronavirus didnt exist in humans until late last year. It remains to be seen whether they will be effective and safe in large numbers of patients.
-- Douglas Perry
@douglasmperry
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Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, speaks during a Coronavirus Task Force news conference at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Tuesday, March 31, 2020.
Chris Kleponis | Bloomberg | Getty Images
The first human trial testing a potential vaccine to prevent COVID-19 is "on track" with public distribution still projected in 12 to 18 months, which would be the "ultimate game changer" in the fight against the pandemic, White House health advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci said Wednesday.
U.S. health officials have been fast-tracking work with biotech companyModernato develop a vaccine to prevent COVID-19. Theybegan their first human trialson a potential vaccine March 16.
The trial had to test three different doses of the vaccine, Fauci said, adding that they've already tested the first two doses and are now administering the highest dose to human volunteers to see if there are any adverse reactions to it.
"It'll take a few months to get the data to where we'll feel confident to go to the phase two, and then a few months from now we'll be in phase two and I think we're right on target for the year to year and a half," Fauci said at a White House press conference with President Donald Trump's coronavirus task force.
Fauci said world health leaders dealing with the coronavirus pandemic, which has infected more than 932,000 people globally, have all agreed that COVID-19 may cycle back in future seasons, and the only protection would be the development of a vaccine.
"The ultimate solution to a virus that might be coming back would be a vaccine," Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said. "The same way a vaccine for other diseases that were scourges in the past that now we don't even worry about."
Dr. Deborah Birx, the coronavirus task force coordinator, said she's been asking universities and private companies to develop rapid coronavirus tests to confirm whether health-care workers that have been treating coronavirus patients already have the antibodies to fight it.
She said the U.S. owes it to health-care workers many of whom have been treating coronavirus patients for a month now "the peace of mind that would come from knowing that you already were infected, you have the antibody, you're safe from reinfection 99.9% of the time." She said U.S. universities can get those tests out by Friday.
However, Fauci said that it's not their priority right now. The main focus is to develop widespread testing for somebody who is infected so they can conduct better case finding and isolation.
Thanks to the coronavirus, WrestleMania did not take place in Tampa this weekend as planned. And on Monday, the wrestler most identified with the city, Hulk Hogan, had a few things to say about COVID-19.
In a religious-themed Instagram post to kick off Easter week, Hogan suggested this new era of social distancing was a form of punishment or discipline from God.
In three short months, just like He did with the plagues of Egypt, God has taken away everything we worship, Hogan wrote. God said, 'you want to worship athletes, I will shut down the stadiums. You want to worship musicians, I will shut down Civic Centers. You want to worship actors, I will shut down theaters. You want to worship money, I will shut down the economy and collapse the stock market. You dont want to go to church and worship Me, I will make it where you cant go to church."
Hogan suggested God needed people to humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways in order to forgive their sin and ... heal their land.
Maybe we dont need a vaccine, Hogan wrote. Maybe we need to take this time of isolation from the distractions of the world and have a personal revival where we focus on the ONLY thing in the world that really matters. Jesus.
View this post on Instagram
Word up,can you handle the truth my brother only love HH In three short months, just like He did with the plagues of Egypt, God has taken away everything we worship. God said, "you want to worship athletes, I will shut down the stadiums. You want to worship musicians, I will shut down Civic Centers. You want to worship actors, I will shut down theaters. You want to worship money, I will shut down the economy and collapse the stock market. You don't want to go to church and worship Me, I will make it where you can't go to church" "If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land." Maybe we don't need a vaccine, Maybe we need to take this time of isolation from the distractions of the world and have a personal revival where we focus on the ONLY thing in the world that really matters. Jesus.
A post shared by Hulk Hogan (@hulkhogan) on Apr 6, 2020 at 5:57am PDT
Scientists are currently racing to produce a coronavirus vaccine, as more than a million cases and tens of thousands of deaths have been attributed to COVID-19 worldwide. That push is already being watched and addressed in the anti-vaccine movement, with politicians skeptical of vaccines forced into an uncomfortable spotlight. In 2019, the World Health Organization labeled vaccine hesitancy one of the top 10 threats to global health.
It was the second time in a week Hogan had gotten religious about the coronavirus on social media. A few days prior, he Instagrammed a highlighted bible passage, II Chronicles 7, verses 13 and 14, which reads: Whenever I hold back the rain or send locusts to eat up the crops or send an epidemic on my people, if they pray to me and repent and turn away from the evil they have been doing, then I will hear them in heaven, forgive their sins, and make their land prosperous again.
Hogan isnt the only celebrity to post that passage in recent weeks. Singer-rapper Young Thug did the same two weeks ago.
Hogan would have been front and center at the WrestleMania spectacle in Tampa. Alongside the rest of the NWO, he was scheduled to be inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in a ceremony at Amalie Arena. He was slated to host a pool party with Lil Jon today at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino. And he likely would have had some role at WrestleMania itself.
Hogan recently reached a confidential settlement with Cox Radio Inc., talk host Mike Calta and others over an alleged conspiracy to leak a damaging sex tape. Calta later called the suit ridiculous nonsense," adding, I did not pay one cent.
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By Louis Jacobson, PolitiFact reporter
As Americans retreat under orders to stay-at-home and stay socially distant, its hard to think too far in the future. But theres one group of medical experts who are firmly focused on what is to come: Vaccine researchers.
Most public officials have made clear not to expect a vaccine in the next few months. Even with an accelerated timetable, it takes time to make certain that a vaccine is safe and effective.
Here, weve summarized a discussion of coronavirus vaccine research with two researchers from the University of Maryland School of Medicine: Kathleen Neuzil, director of the Center for Vaccine Development and Global Health, and Wilbur Chen, an adult infectious disease expert with the same center. The discussion was sponsored by the National Press Foundation on April 3.
Its not unusual for vaccine development timelines to take 10 to 15 years, Chen said.
Generally, a vaccine trial has several phases. In an initial phase, lasting about six months, the vaccine is given to roughly 50 to 100 healthy volunteers. The focus in this phase is to make sure the vaccine is safe for general use, or to note whether bad reactions occur.
In the second phase, lasting six to 12 months, the number of volunteers is expanded to the hundreds. In addition to monitoring the vaccine for safety, researchers try to determine whether the shot produces an immune-system response.
The third phase can last from one to three years and involves thousands of patients, and it may require several rounds that focus on specific subgroups. This phase continues the goals of the first two, but it also collects data on more unusual negative interactions.
Yes. The first U.S. clinical trials for a coronavirus vaccine began in March, meaning they were up and running just a couple of months after the virus was detected an unusually quick start. There is also a separate vaccine being tested in China.
"When we have a pandemic, we try to truncate everything," Chen said. That was done in the case of Ebola virus outbreaks in recent years, and with the coronavirus pandemic, the timeline will be pushed even more, he said.
For coronavirus, "it could end up being less than 18 months, closer to 12, or in the absolutely best case, maybe less than that," Neuzil said. That would be "a tremendous feat," she said.
Neuzil said she expects that there will be "more, and ideally many more," vaccines to begin clinical trials in the coming months. Its beneficial to simultaneously test a range of experimental vaccines to maximize the chance that at least one will work.
In addition, having a lot of options makes it possible that a later design might offer practical improvements ease of administering the shot, or cost of production over the first effective vaccine on the market.
If all goes well, Neuzil said, there may be five or six vaccines in trials by six from months from now. "It could be higher," she said. "A couple are getting close."
Partly, it had to do with pandemic-related flexibility granted to federal regulators. But a big reason is that the vaccine being tested is an update of a vaccine format that has been used safely and successfully against other illnesses. Vaccines with more novel designs would typically require more extensive testing before bringing them to market.
Only about 5% to 10%, Neuzil said.
When a vaccine fails, its usually not because of safety concerns, she said. More likely, it didnt produce enough of an immune response to be useful in combating the germs its targeting. In other cases, the problem comes from difficulty in manufacturing it economically, given the demand. The latter shouldnt be a problem with the coronavirus, since demand will be sky high globally.
Vaccines based on a familiar design will be easier to produce, Neuzil said. Another factor that could speed up the process is if manufacturers, possibly with government backing, begin to build out their production capacity before the vaccine is approved.
Also, because of the urgency of the pandemic, different companies in different countries may collaborate on production, maximizing the number of doses that can be produced in parallel. Theres precedent for this "technology transfer" approach; a cholera vaccine is being produced by multiple manufacturers, Chen said.
The good news is that demand will be high, making it easer for vaccine manufacturers to make these decisions.
We dont know yet. "Weve only known about this virus for less than four months," Neuzil said. "Its impossible to answer this question until we have some longer-term data."
Scientists do have some hints from previous coronaviruses that circulated in recent years. For some of those, immunity only lasts six to 12 months. If thats the case with COVID-19, vaccinations may be an annual rite, or more frequently, just as influenza shots are.
