Category: Covid-19 Vaccine

What threatens public health more, a deliberately false Facebook post about tracking microchips in the COVID-19 vaccine that is flagged as misinformation, or an unflagged, factual article about the rare case of a young, healthy person who died after receiving the vaccine?

According to Duncan J. Watts, Stevens University Professor in Computer and Information Science at Penn Engineering and Director of the Computational Social Science (CSS) Lab, along with David G. Rand, Erwin H. Schell Professor at MIT Sloan School of Management, and Jennifer Allen, 2024 MIT Sloan School of Management Ph.D. graduate and incoming CSS postdoctoral fellow, the latter is much more damaging. "The misinformation flagged by fact-checkers was 46 times less impactful than the unflagged content that nonetheless encouraged vaccine skepticism," they conclude in a new paper in Science.

Historically, research on "fake news" has focused almost exclusively on deliberately false or misleading content, on the theory that such content is much more likely to shape human behavior. But, as Allen points out, "When you actually look at the stories people encounter in their day-to-day information diets, fake news is a miniscule percentage. What people are seeing is either no news at all or mainstream media."

Since the 2016 U.S. presidential election, many thousands of papers have been published about the dangers of false information propagating on social media. But what this literature has almost universally overlooked is the related danger of information that is merely biased. That's what we look at here in the context of COVID vaccines."

DuncanJ. Watts, Stevens University Professor in Computer and Information Science atPennEngineering

In the study, Watts, one of the paper's senior authors, and Allen, the paper's first author, used thousands of survey results and AI to estimate the impact of more than 13,000 individual Facebook posts. "Our methodology allows us to estimate the effect of each piece of content on Facebook," says Allen. "What makes our paper really unique is that it allows us to break open Facebook and actually understand what types of content are driving misinformed-ness."

One of the paper's key findings is that "fake news," or articles flagged as misinformation by professional fact-checkers, has a much smaller overall effect on vaccine hesitancy than unflagged stories that the researchers describe as "vaccine-skeptical," many of which focus on statistical anomalies that suggest that COVID-19 vaccines are dangerous.

"Obviously, people are misinformed," says Allen, pointing to the low vaccination rates among U.S. adults, in particular for the COVID-19 booster vaccine, "but it doesn't seem like fake news is doing it." One of the most viewed URLs on Facebook during the time period covered by the study, at the height of the pandemic, for instance, was a true story in a reputable newspaper about a doctor who happened to die shortly after receiving the COVID-19 vaccine.

That story racked up tens of millions of views on the platform, multiples of the combined number of views of all COVID-19-related URLs that Facebook flagged as misinformation during the time period covered by the study. "Vaccine-skeptical content that's not being flagged by Facebook is potentially lowering users' intentions to get vaccinated by 2.3 percentage points," Allen says. "A back-of-the-envelope estimate suggests that translates to approximately 3 million people who might have gotten vaccinated had they not seen this content."

Despite the fact that, in the survey results, fake news identified by fact-checkers proved more persuasive on an individual basis, so many more users were exposed to the factual, vaccine-skeptical articles with clickbait-style headlines that the overall impact of the latter outstripped that of the former.

"Even though misinformation, when people see it, can be more persuasive than factual content in the context of vaccine hesitancy," says Allen, "it is seen so little that these accurate, 'vaccine-skeptical' stories dwarf the impact of outright false claims."

As the researchers point out, being able to quantify the impact of misleading but factual stories points to a fundamental tension between free expression and combating misinformation, as Facebook would be unlikely to shut down mainstream publications. "Deciding how to weigh these competing values is an extremely challenging normative question with no straightforward solution," the authors write in the paper.

Allen points to content moderation that involves the user community as one possible means to address this challenge. "Crowdsourcing fact-checking and moderation works surprisingly well," she says. "That's a potential, more democratic solution."

With the 2024 U.S. Presidential election on the horizon, Allen emphasizes the need for Americans to seriously consider these tradeoffs. "The most popular story on Facebook in the lead-up to the 2020 election was about military ballots found in the trash that were mostly votes for Donald Trump," she notes. "That was a real story, but the headline did not mention that there were nine votes total, seven of them for Trump."

This study was conducted at the University of Pennsylvania's School of Engineering and Applied Science, the Annenberg School for Communication and the Wharton School, along with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Sloan School of Management, and was supported by funding from Alain Rossmann.

Sources:

Journal reference:

Allen, J., et al. (2024). Quantifying the impact of misinformation and vaccine-skeptical content on Facebook.Science. doi.org/10.1126/science.adk3451.

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Unflagged stories drive vaccine hesitancy more than debunked misinformation - News-Medical.Net

Believe it or not, legal disputes over vaccine mandate policies from the COVID-era continue to work their way through various courts. This month, the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals granted a preliminary injunction to employees of the University of Colorado at Anschutz, who were denied a religious exemption from the schools COVID-19 vaccine requirement, overturning a district courts ruling which upheld the vaccine policy.

Most notably, the 2-1 court majority held that the universitys inquiry into the nature of each employees religious objection violates their First Amendment rights under the Establishment Clause. Each employee requesting a religious exemption was asked:

1) Please explain why your sincerely held religious belief, practice, or observance prevents you from getting a COVID-19 vaccination? Please include a detailed response. 2) Have you had an influenza or other vaccine in the past? How does this differ?

The university explained that such questions were designed to determine whether the beliefs at issue were in fact religious and were sincerely held. As the dissent noted, that is a difficult and delicate task, but the mere assertion of generic religious objections is not sufficient to invoke First Amendment protections.

The majority, however, found the inquiry to be too invasive. Here is an excerpt from the opinion:

The Administrations official religious exemption form did not ask whether an applicants sincerely-held religious belief prevented her from receiving the COVID-19 vaccine. It instead asked why an applicants sincerely held religious belief, practice, or observance prevents her from getting a COVID-19 vaccination. The Administration also demanded that applicants explain whether they had an influenza or other vaccine in the past, and justify how this differ[s]. In response to the Administrations demands, some applicants submitted numerous pages of explanation of their religious beliefs, including deeply personal and private details about their religious journeys.

[The] Administration decided that a Roman Catholic applicants religious objection to the COVID-19 vaccine does not constitute a religious belief, but a personal objection, because in the Administrations view, it is of a personal nature and not part of a comprehensive system of religious beliefs. That is precisely the sort of religious entanglement the Establishment Clause proscribes.

Dissenting judge David Ebel agreed that a policy favoring one religious belief (those who object to all vaccinations) over another (those who object only to the COVID-19 vaccine) is unconstitutional, and would have granted the injunction on that basis. But he disagreed that the policy is evidence in itself of animus and hostility toward religions. Further, he would have upheld the universitys inquiry into employee beliefs as constitutional. The University is entitled to ask an individual requesting a religious exemption to explain the belief upon which that request is based, he argued. How else could the University determine whether and how it could accommodate the request? Judge Ebel would also have upheld an amended policy that removed the employee inquiry and based exemptions on the nature of the employees job requirements, but the majority found the amended policy to be pretextual and creating the same outcome.

The appeals court ruling orders the trial court to grant the plaintiffs motion for an injunction that would reverse plaintiffs religious exemption denials pursuant to both the original (September 1) and amended (September 24) policies, and it requires the university to revoke and re-examine all other denials of religious accommodation requests.

Importantly, the decision impacts only the vaccination mandate examined in this particular case. The court emphasized the specific details surrounding the universitys implementation of the policies in question. But it does raise important general questions about how and to what extent an employees religious accommodation request can be scrutinized for its sincerity.

For more on the intersection of vaccine mandates and religious liberty, check outSeason 3, episode 3 of BJCs essential podcast, Respecting Religion. BJC General Counsel Holly Hollman and Executive Director Amanda Tyler discuss the issue with clarity and detail in that episode from 2021.

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Federal court grants injunction reversing university's denial of religious exemptions from COVID vaccine mandate ... - Baptist Joint Committee for...

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Germany has scrapped a requirement for its military servicepeople to be vaccinated against COVID-19, a mandate that had been in place since late 2021, the government said Wednesday.

People serving with the German military, the Bundeswehr, are required to get vaccinations against a number of diseases including measles, mumps and flu so long as individuals have no specific health issues to prevent that.

COVID-19 was added to the list in November 2021, meaning that anyone who refused to get vaccinated against it could face disciplinary measures.

LARGEST-EVER COVID VACCINE STUDY LINKS SHOT TO SMALL INCREASE IN HEART AND BRAIN CONDITIONS

Defense Minister Boris Pistorius has now dropped the COVID-19 requirement following recommendations from the Bundeswehr's chief medical officer and a military medical advisory committee, ministry spokesperson Mitko Mller said. It has been replaced by a strong recommendation to get the vaccine.

A soldier of the German military stands inside a vaccination center at the former Tempelhof airport in Berlin, Germany, before its opening on March 8, 2021. Germany has scrapped a requirement for its military personnel to be vaccinated against COVID-19, a mandate that had been in place since late 2021, the government said on Wednesday. (Tobias Schwarz / Pool via AP, File)

News of the decision came as Germany's Federal Administrative Court considered a complaint by a noncommissioned officer in the navy against the continued vaccination requirement.

Germany contemplated a COVID-19 vaccine mandate for all adults in the country in late 2021 and early 2022, but some government lawmakers and most of the opposition balked at the idea.

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In April 2022, lawmakers rejected a narrower bill that would have required all people 60 and over to be vaccinated.

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Germany lifts mandatory COVID vaccination requirement for military following committee recommendation - Fox News

Major hospital system's vaccine mandate may have violated religious rights, court says

by JACKSON WALKER | The National Desk

File photo of protesters rallying against required COVID-19 vaccinations (Photo by RINGO CHIU/AFP via Getty Images).

ROCHESTER, Minn. (TND)

The top-ranked Mayo Clinic, headquartered in Minnesota, may have violated the religious rights of five of its employees who were dismissed for failing to comply with its COVID-19 vaccine mandate, an appeals court ruled last week.

A district court in 2023 ruled the workers had failed to ground their complaint against the mandate in sincere Christian beliefs and ordered the suit be tossed out. However, a panel of judges with the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in St. Louis now says the case warrants further review.

Contributing to the decision was Judge Duane Benton, an appointee of former President George W. Bush, and Judges Ralph Erickson and Jonathan Kobes, who were appointed by former President Donald Trump.

Mayo Clinic said it will vigorously defend its actions in a statement to The National Desk (TND).

Mayo Clinic established its vaccination program to protect the health and safety of our staff, patients and communities, it wrote. The program included an exemption to accommodate sincerely held religious beliefs, and Mayo granted the majority of requests for religious exemptions. In its decision, the Court of Appeals did not criticize Mayos vaccination program or its employment actions; rather, the court merely ruled that the plaintiffs may resume their legal claims.

Other major health providers have come under fire for similar vaccine requirements. Catholic healthcare system Providence Health & Services in 2023 asked its employees to receive a COVID vaccine to protect its "vulnerable patient population" and community.

Follow Jackson Walker on X at @_jlwalker_ for the latest trending national news. Have a news tip? Send it to jacwalker@sbgtv.com.

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Major hospital system's vaccine mandate may have violated religious rights, court says - KEYE TV CBS Austin

SciCheck Digest

A rare risk of dangerous blood clots associated with the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine was identified and reported in early 2021. This month, the company announced it was pulling the vaccine off the market globally, citing a decline in demand. Social media posts misleadingly linked the decision to the company having admitted the rare side effect for the first time in court documents and used it to impugn all vaccines.

The association between the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine and a rare and dangerous blood clotting condition combined with low blood platelets has been known for more than three years.The condition is known as thrombosis with thrombocytopenia syndrome, or TTS, in general, and vaccine-induced thrombotic thrombocytopenia, or VITT, when it implies an association to vaccines.

The European Medicines Agency, which regulates vaccines in the European Union,first warnedof the possible link between the vaccine and very rare cases of blood clots associated with thrombocytopenia, i.e. low levels of blood platelets on March 18, 2021. In astatementissued that same day, the pharmaceutical company acknowledged the finding and said it recognises and will implement EMAs recommendations, including updating the product information to warn about the reported cases.

A few weeks later, in April 2021, the EMAconcludedthe unusual blood clots should be listed as very rare side effects of the vaccine.TTS is included in the possible side effects section in the package leaflet for users for Vaxzevria (page 30), one of the brand names of the vaccine along with Covishield. TTS has also been listed in Covishields product insert under the special warnings section, as a side effect in the fact sheet for recipients since at least August 2021, and as a possible adverse reaction in an FAQ page from its manufacturer that was updated on July 5, 2021.

In September 2021, the National Health Service in England reportedthat the rare condition affected approximately 1 in 50,000 AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine recipients under 50 years old and 1 in 100,000 recipients older than 50. Between May 2021 and May 2022, there were 443 cases of TTSreported following vaccination in the U.K.; 81 of them were fatal. (In July 2021, thevaccinewas also linked to rare cases of Guillain-Barr syndrome, a neurological disorder that leads to muscle weakness and, at times, paralysis. The World Health Organization said that most people recover fully.)

The vaccinewas never used in the U.S. outside clinical trials AstraZeneca decidednot to file the application for approval.But the vaccine was widely used in the rest of the world, especially during 2021.

In March, the European Commission withdrewAstraZenecas authorization to market its COVID-19 vaccine in the European Union, at the companys request, and on May 7, the company announced it was pulling the vaccine from the market globally. Social media posts misleadingly framed the companys recent decision as a consequence of admitting the rare TTS condition for the first time in court documents, as part of a lawsuit in the U.K. The claim was also shared in Spanish.

AstraZenecahad saidthe decision was based on a decline in demand. Other COVID-19 vaccine manufacturers had developed new versions to target variants of the virus that causes COVID-19.As multiple, variant COVID-19 vaccines have since been developed there is a surplus of available updated vaccines, the company said in a statement sent to us.

AstraZeneca finally WITHDRAW Covid vaccine worldwide, months after the pharmaceutical giant admitted for the first time in court documents that it can cause a rare and dangerous side effect. Never forget how they cancelled anyone who questioned its safety, reads aviral postshared across social media platforms.

The U.K. news website the Telegraphhad reportedon April 28 that AstraZeneca had admitted its COVID-19 vaccine could cause TTS in an apparent about-turn that could pave the way for a multi-million pound legal payout in a class action lawsuit in which the company is being sued for death and serious injury in dozens of cases. The article said the company hadnt said that in a court document before.But the story went on to say that a link between the vaccine and the rare blood clotting condition was identified in March 2021, as we said.

On May 7, the Telegraph reported that AstraZeneca was being withdrawn worldwide, months after the pharmaceutical giant admitted for the first time in court documents that it can cause a rare and dangerous side effect. The next day, the Independent, a British online newspaper, published a story with the headline AstraZeneca withdraws Covid vaccine worldwide after admitting it can cause rare blood clots.

Christina Pagel, professor of operational research at University College London, said the headlines were needlessly scary on her blog on May 8, and days later in an op-ed with Sheena Cruickshank, immunologist at the University of Manchester,in the New Statesman, a U.K. publication.

Fundamentally, the situation is this: there isnt a new smoking gun; the AZ vaccine was one of the first and cheapest vaccines; it saved millions of lives globally; and there are better vaccines out there now, adapted to new variants, they wrote.

Even though the rare risk associated with the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine was reported early on and was well-known, some social media users took the Telegraphs news reports as vindication.

Now they admit it,wroteconservative commentator Dan Bongino in a Facebook post, linking to a Rumble video titled AstraZeneca Makes SHOCKING Admission About COVID Vax We Were Right All Along.

Others used the apparent news to cast shade on all other COVID-19 vaccines. Its not just the Astra Zeneca, one Facebook post said.

A commenter to a post on Instagram wrote, Whens the class action lawsuit against the US Government?, although the vaccine was not authorized for use in the U.S. Another one wrote, When will Pfizer finally step up and do the same?, although the Pfizer/BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine has not been linked to TTS.

Just like other COVID-19 vaccines authorized or approved for use, the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine, co-developed by Oxford University,wasfoundtobesafe and effective for people over 18 years old in clinical trials and in further studies.The efficacy of the vaccine in preventing symptomatic diseasein clinical trials was 74%, which was lower than its mRNA counterparts, namely the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines.

After the potentially deadly blood clot side effect was identified in 2021, many countriesrestricted the AstraZeneca vaccine usefor only older populations. The reported TTS cases were more prevalent among those younger than 50.

Because AstraZenecas vaccine wascheaper and easier to distributethan other COVID-19 vaccines, it was among thefirst vaccinessent to poorer countries byCOVAX, a global initiative that allowed for equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines.

Since its rollout, more than 3 billion doses were distributed in over 180 countries,accordingto a 2022 statement from thevaccine developers, with approximately two-thirds of the doses going to poorer countries. A2022 analysis by Airfinity, a disease-forecasting company, showed that the vaccine saved 6.3 million lives from December 2020 to December 2021.The company used data from a study by scientists with the Imperial College London on the global impact of COVID-19 vaccination during that year.

As we said, the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine was not used in the U.S. outside clinical trials.

The Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine, though, uses the same platform as the AstraZeneca vaccine. Both use a modified, harmless adenovirus, a type of virus that typically causes the common cold, to trigger an immune response. The J&J vaccine was granted an emergency use authorization in February 2021, but soon after, in April of that year, the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported casesof TTS following the administration of the vaccine and recommended a pause in its use. The FDA also reportedrare cases of GBSin July 2021.

The FDAlimited the authorizationof the J&J vaccine to certain people in May 2022, and the vaccine was ultimately discontinued in 2023. As of April 7, 2022, the CDC and FDA had confirmed 60 cases of TTS, including nine deaths, among more than 18.6 million J&J vaccines administered. In September 2023, the CDC said TTS after J&J COVID-19 vaccination has occurred in approximately 4 cases per one million doses administered.

The first two COVID-19 vaccines authorized and approved in the U.S., the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines, are both mRNA vaccines. The mRNA COVID-19 vaccines were widely used in the U.S., and neither has been linked to TTS. For context, as of April 26, 2023, approximately 367 million doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine, 232 million doses of the Moderna vaccine and 19 million doses of the J&J vaccine had been administered in the country.

Both mRNA vaccines have been shown to be safe, with rare serious side effects reported, and effective at preventing severe COVID-19 disease and death. One estimate published in December 2022suggeststhat COVID-19 vaccines prevented more than 18 million hospitalizations and 3 million deaths in the U.S.

Editors note: SciChecks articles providing accurate health information and correcting health misinformation are made possible by a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The foundation has no control over FactCheck.orgs editorial decisions, and the views expressed in our articles do not necessarily reflect the views of the foundation.

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New research from scientists at La Jolla Institute for Immunology (LJI) suggests people who received COVID-19 vaccines and then experienced "breakthrough" infections are especially well armed against future SARS-CoV-2 infections.

By analyzing blood samples from study volunteers, the LJI researchers discovered that people who experienced symptomatic breakthrough infections develop T cells that are better at recognizing and targeting SARS-CoV-2, including the omicron and delta variants. The researchers describe this increased protection as an "immunity wall."

"The virus evolves, but, importantly, so does the immune system. T cells do not sit idle. Instead, they learn to recognize the parts of the virus that mutate," says LJI Professor Alessandro Sette, who co-led the Cell Reports Medicine study with LJI Professor Shane Crotty, Ph.D., and LJI Research Assistant Professor Alba Grifoni, Ph.D.

Study volunteers who experienced symptomatic breakthrough infections developed T cells that recognized multiple targets on the SARS-CoV-2 viral "Spike" and non-Spike epitopes. This infection left study volunteers with T cells that were better equipped to recognize mutated regions on new SARS-CoV-2 variants.

Even asymptomatic breakthrough infections boost T cell responses, though the effect was not as significant. Breakthrough infections also led B cells to produce cross-reactive antibodies against SARS-CoV-2. Most of these antibodies targeted the new viral variants and the original vaccine antigens.

The researchers found no evidence of harmful "T cell exhaustion" in study volunteers who had experienced repeated COVID-19 vaccinations and SARS-CoV-2 infections.

Many studies have shown that vaccination against SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, provides people with significant immune protection against severe disease. Several LJI-led studies have shown that this immune protection is long-lasting and can even help protect the body from new viral "variants of concern."

For the new study, LJI scientists investigated exactly how breakthrough infections affect T cells and B cells. The researchers followed a large group of study volunteers who had been vaccinated against SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. Over time, many of these volunteers experienced breakthrough infections. The LJI scientists followed up with these volunteers to collect new blood samples post infection.

"With this study volunteer cohort, we were in a unique position to see how the immune system looked before and after a breakthrough infection," says Grifoni.

Study co-first author and LJI Postdoctoral Researcher Alison Tarke, Ph.D., spearheaded research showing that breakthrough infections prompted T cells to expand their "repertoires." That meant the cells could recognize multiple features, or antigens, on SARS-CoV-2.

These T cells appeared to develop their broad repertoires due to a combination of vaccination and breakthrough infection. COVID-19 vaccines taught the T cells to recognize a key part of SARS-CoV-2 called the "Spike" protein. Meanwhile, SARS-CoV-2 infection prompted T cells to recognize Spike, as well as several other viral proteins.

Breakthrough infection had left these study volunteers with T cells that could recognize and target SARS-CoV-2, even if part of it was mutated.

Breakthrough omicron and delta variant infections also prompted B cells to produce more diverse antibodies. These antibodies could target epitopes that the vaccine and the infecting SARS-CoV-2 variant had in common.

In fact, most of these new antibodies were good at attacking epitopes that the vaccine and the variants had in common. "New B cell responses that are only specific to the infecting variant, but not the vaccine, are very rare," says study co-first author and LJI Instructor Parham Ramezani-Rad, Ph.D.

The researchers uncovered another interesting trend in people with breakthrough infections. COVID-19 vaccines tend to be given in the upper arm, which means anti-SARS-CoV-2 immune cells develop far away from the upper respiratory system. SARS-CoV-2 tends to infect the upper respiratory tract first, which means there can be a delay getting the right immune cells to the scene of infection.

"A breakthrough infection has the potential of adding a layer of protection on top of a vaccine," says Grifoni.

As they worked, the scientists also found markers of previous SARS-CoV-2 infection in about 30% of study volunteers who had never shown COVID-19 symptoms. These volunteers appeared to have contracted asymptomatic cases of COVID-19 at some point earlier in the pandemic.

"Our study suggests most people who never thought they got a breakthrough infection actually did," says Grifoni. "The majority of the population appears to be affected by a combination of vaccination and one or more breakthrough infections."

The new study also addresses concerns that repeated infection or COVID-19 vaccine might lead to a phenomenon called T cell exhaustion, where T cells lose their ability to target a pathogen.

The researchers discovered that breakthrough infections prompted T cells to produce more types of cytokines, signaling molecules that help fight infection. Before a breakthrough infection, T cells might produce one or two types of cytokines, Grifoni explains.

"After the breakthrough infection, the same cells produce multiple types of cytokines, making them more efficacious," says Grifoni. "Not only are our T cells not exhausted, but they are actually improving their capabilities."

The "immunity wall" does seem to have limits. Following an asymptomatic breakthrough infection, T cell abilities appeared to plateau in response to a subsequent symptomatic infection. B cells continued to produce neutralizing antibodies following subsequent breakthrough infections, but the researchers didn't see the same big "boost" to neutralizing antibody levels.

So should people continue to get SARS-CoV-2 booster vaccines? The LJI scientists point out that SARS-CoV-2 continues to evolve, and COVID-19 can still cause serious illness in immunocompromised people. Their advice is to follow all current CDC guidelines on who should receive booster vaccines.

This research is also an important step toward the development of new vaccines against future SARS-CoV-2 variants and many other viruses with pandemic potential.

Ramezani-Rad says the study helps answer important questions about how breakthrough infections alter antibody responses. Going forward, he is curious how future SARS-CoV-2 variantsor new vaccine designsmight further tweak the immune system.

"Studies of local B cell responses in the upper airwaywhere the infection occurswill also be informative on how B cells responses are induced, particularly after breakthrough infection," says Ramezani-Rad.

Sette and Grifoni are focused on how to train T cells to recognize many types of coronaviruses at once. Their research is critical for developing a "pan-coronavirus" vaccine.

In a 2023 study, their laboratories worked with scientists at the University of Genoa to show that some T cells can recognize multiple coronaviruses at once. This new study shows them how breakthrough infections can shape T cell responses to fight novel SARS-CoV-2 variants.

"We're very interested to see if this phenomenon could be exploited in general to prepare against other potential pandemic threats," says Sette. "This is a step in a journey to help us protect against viral infections and potential pandemics."

Additional authors of the study, "SARS-CoV-2 breakthrough infections enhance T cell response magnitude, breadth, and epitope repertoire," include Tertuliano Alves Pereira Neto, Yeji Lee, Vanessa Silva-Moraes, Benjamin Goodwin, Nathaniel Bloom, Leila Siddiqui, Liliana Avalos, April Frazier, Zeli Zhang, Ricardo da Silva Antunes, and Jennifer Dan.

More information: Alison Tarke et al, SARS-CoV-2 breakthrough infections enhance T cell response magnitude, breadth, and epitope repertoire, Cell Reports Medicine (2024). DOI: 10.1016/j.xcrm.2024.101583

Journal information: Cell Reports Medicine

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How COVID-19 'breakthrough' infections alter your immune cells - Medical Xpress

COVID-19 patients vaccinated against the novel coronavirus were less likely to have symptoms of post-COVID condition (PCC), or long COVID, according to a new study in Nature Communications.

The study was based on outcomes seen among patients in eight large healthcare systems in the United States who had positive SARS-CoV-2 tests between March 2021 and February 2022.

The authors of the study defined PCC as a new diagnosis in one of 13 PCC categories 30 days to 6 months following a positive SARS-CoV-2 test.

The authors matched 161,531 vaccinated COVID-19 patients to unvaccinated patients using electronic health records. Of the vaccinated patients, 96.7% had two doses of COVID-19 vaccine, and among both vaccinated and unvaccinated patients, less than 1% of included COVID-19 cases had evidence of SARS-CoV-2 re-infection.

"Most patients with SARS-CoV-2 were identified in December 2021 and January 2022, approximately reflecting the time period during which Omicron was the dominant circulating variant and COVID-19 vaccination coverage was high in the US," the authors said.

Most patients with SARS-CoV-2 were identified in December 2021 and January 2022, approximately reflecting the time period during which Omicron was the dominant circulating variant.

The average age of COVID-19 patients was 37.1 years, and 37.1% were White, while 36.2% were Hispanic.

During an average 151-day follow-up period, the authors found the risk of PCC was significantly lower for vaccinated than for unvaccinated patients for 9 of the 13 outcomes studied.

Vaccination was associated with a greater than 10% lower risk of sensory (relative risk [RR], 0.90), circulatory (RR, 0.88), blood and hematologic (RR, 0.79), skin and subcutaneous (RR, 0.69), and non-specific COVID-related disorders (RR, 0.53).

Vaccinated patients, however, were at a slightly increased risk of mental illness compared with unvaccinated patients over the study period (RR, 1.06).

In other long-COVID research news, a study in the International Journal of Infectious Diseases describes new estimates of long-COVID incidence and clinical study trends in a number of regions.

Overall, the incidence of long COVID was 31% in North America, 44% in Europe, and 51% in Asia.

The authors said the proportion of long-COVID studies investigating potential treatments increased from 45.7% (95% confidence interval [CI], 31.3% to 60.1%) in 2020 to 64.9% (95% CI, 57.3% to 72.5%) in 2023, with an average annual percentage change of 15.7%.

A total of 312 studies were found to be testing potential therapies for long COVID. Of these, the United States conducted 18.6% of clinical studies on long COVID between 2020 and 2023, followed by India (17.6%), and Spain (6.4%).

"In contrast, more long COVID studies are needed for European long COVID population, the authors said.

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Study shows vaccination lowers risk of long COVID - University of Minnesota Twin Cities

When COVID-19 vaccines entered the commercial market, the federal government introduced a program to make shots accessible to people with limited coverage or no insurance. That program which provided millions of free shots to low-income people is now coming to a halt, U.S. health officials said.

The Bridge Access Program is set to end in August, months earlier than local health departments and health centers expected as pandemic-era funding from Congress is expiring. Biden administration officials are seeking permanent funding so that routine vaccinations can remain free for adults, through a program akin to the long-standing Vaccines for Children program, a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention official said via email.

Leaders at health centers and departments said without the Bridge Access Program, theyre worried about how theyll secure funding for vaccines in preparation for the winter respiratory viral season when hospitalizations and deaths tend to increase. Many low-income Americans may be unable to afford vaccines for the novel coronavirus and its myriad variants. Updated vaccines will be formulated to target these strains, but pandemic-era funding will be gone.

Leaders at the National Association for Community Health Centers, a nonprofit advocacy group, said they knew the program was temporary, but were surprised to hear it was ending this August. As looming respiratory illnesses such as flu, RSV and COVID-19 increase in the colder months this year, health centers will continue to immunize people daily, said Sarah Price, the associations director of public health integration, in a statement. Health centers will either stock these vaccines or refer to resources within their community with an aim to addressing access barriers and closing the loop, she said.

Since Bridge Access launched in September 2023, it has provided more than 1.4 million free COVID-19 vaccines through retail pharmacies, community health centers and public health departments across the U.S., David Daigle, a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention spokesperson, said in an email. The CDC did not respond to inquiries about whether the agency told health centers and departments the Bridge program would be ending in August.

Vaccine manufacturers Novavax and Pfizer said via email they planned to assess their accessibility options for U.S. consumers in the wake of this change and help ensure the vaccines were accessible for uninsured and underinsured patients. Moderna did not respond to a request for comment.

The loss of the program has made health officials worry about an uptick in cases.

This is creating a barrier that could lead to much larger resurgences of COVID, said Dr. Walter Orenstein, associate director at the Emory University Vaccine Center. Orenstein formerly worked as the U.S. National Immunization Program director with the Vaccines for Children program launch in the 1990s and foresees trouble if vaccines are not made more accessible.

I hope Im wrong. But I think that (its) better to remove barriers to access when we have such safe and effective vaccines than to prevent people [who want] those vaccines to get vaccinated.

The U.S. has reached a record low of uninsured people, the Department of Health and Human Services announced in August. However, about 7.7% of the population, or around 25 million people, still dont have health insurance. Among adults 18 and older, 11% are uninsured.

In addition, millions of adults have less-than-robust health coverage through their employer and many earn too much to qualify for Medicaid. People in this category likely would have had difficulty getting a COVID-19 vaccine without Bridge Access funding.

The vaccine funding is ending as Medicaid is being rolled back across the U.S. Nearly 22 million people who had Medicaid during the pandemic have been disenrolled as of May 10, according to KFF, a nonpartisan health policy organization.

The next round of COVID-19 vaccines intended to target dominating strains has not been released.

Continued here:

Free COVID-19 vaccines could be a thing of the past as federal program is set to expire early - Chicago Sun-Times

Northampton County Executive Lamont G. McClure, in collaboration with the Northampton County Department of Community and Economic Development, Emergency Management Services, and Lehigh Valley Hospital-Coordinated Health Allentown Hospital (LVH-CHA), announces the closure of the COVID-19 vaccinations and testing sites in Northampton County.

The vaccination site, LVPG Internal Medicine Pine Street (325 Pine Street, Easton, PA 18042), and associated walk-in testing centers located at Bangor ExpressCARE, Bethlehem Township ExpressCARE, and Palmer Township ExpressCARE played a pivotal role in the regions response to the pandemic which will now close on Saturday, June 1, 2024.

The COVID-19 vaccine continues to be the most effective way to protect each other from severe illness and death. I extend our deepest gratitude to LVH-CHA for their unwavering dedication in providing vaccination and testing services to Northampton County residents and employees for four years, stated Executive Lamont McClure. We will never be able to measure the number of livesthatwerepotentially savedor the significant impact this partnership had on the thousands of County residents who utilized the testing site. I would be remiss if I did not express gratitude to the LVHN healthcare workers who administered the tests and vaccinations.

While the closure of the testing and vaccination site marks the end of a significant chapter in Northampton Countys COVID-19 response, the County remains committed to protecting the health and safety of our residents.

For further information on testing and vaccination options, the public is encouraged to visit:www.lvhn.org/treatments/covid-19-vaccines

Information provided to TVL by: County of Northampton 669 Washington Street Easton, PA 18042 https://www.northamptoncounty.org/

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Closure of the COVID-19 Vaccination and Testing Site - The Valley Ledger

The North Carolina Supreme Court will consider the case of a Guilford County teenager who was vaccinated against COVID-19 in 2021 despite his objections and without parental consent.

A court order Thursday confirmed that the high court will take up the case of Tanner Smith, who was 14 when he faced the forced vaccination. Smiths mother, Emily Happel, is also a plaintiff in the lawsuit against the Guilford County school board and Old North State Medical Society.

Lower courts have ruled against the mother and son. A unanimous state Court of Appeals panel ruled in March that a federal law, the Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness Act, protected the school board and medical group from legal liability linked to the vaccination.

Thursdays court order signaled that Supreme Court justices will consider a single issue from Happel and Smiths appeal: Whether the trial court and the Court of Appeals erred when they determined that the PREP Act provided immunity to the defendants for constitutional violations and pre-empted all state law claims.

The case has attracted attention from eight Republican members of North Carolinas House of Representatives. They filed a brief on April 12 urging the high court to take the case.

They have a special interest in protecting the fundamental rights of the parents they represent and for whom the General Assembly has recently enacted legislation on the very subject embraced by this appeal, wrote Tyler Brooks of the Thomas More Society, who represents the eight legislators.

As members of the General Assembly, they have a unique role in ensuring that local governmental bodies, particularly those charged with public education or who otherwise interact with children, abide by and are governed according to North Carolina state law, Brooks added. In this same vein, they further have a strong interest in ensuring that the enactments of the General Assembly are upheld against erroneous findings of federal preemption, as occurred in the instant case.

The Guilford school board and Old North State Medical Society filed separate documents asking North Carolinas highest court not to take the case.

The school boards court filing asked the court to reject claims from Happel and Smith on the grounds that the alleged constitutional questions are not real and substantial and that the subject matter of this case does not involve legal principles of major significance to the jurisprudence of this State or raise issues of significant public interest.

[T]he direct issue before the Court of Appeals is not a substantial constitutional question rather, it is a straightforward application of federal statutory immunity, which applies to the same degree to state law claims and state constitutional claims, and which is not at all an issue of first impression, the Guilford schools lawyers wrote. In fact, the idea of federal law overriding contrary state constitutional provisions appears in the U.S. Constitution itself, which expressly states that federal law supersedes both contrary state laws and state constitutions.

Even the specific idea of the PREP Act immunizing against constitutional claims is not a new one, the court filing added. Guilfords brief cited a 2024 decision from the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals holding that, through the PREP Act, Congress expressly foreclosed federal constitutional claims related to covered countermeasures.

Happel and Smith filed a petition on April 5 asking the states highest court to take their case.

The pandemic that occurred from 2020-2022 caused a seismic shift in the social, medical, political, and legal landscape of not only the State of North Carolina, not only the United States, but the world as a whole, wrote lawyer David Steven Walker. How the government chose to deal with the pandemic, especially concerning the administration of vaccines that had been granted emergency use authorizations, was and is a hotly contested issue, one that is certainly of significant public interest.

This public interest is even more significant when the issue revolves around the vaccination of a minor and the allegation that neither the minor nor the minors parent consented to the administration of the vaccine, Walker added.

The case deals with the interplay between duty of the courts of North Carolina to remedy constitutional and other legal violations and a federal law that defendants purport forecloses that opportunity, Walker wrote.

The trial court and the Court of Appeals interpreted the PREP Act so broadly as to shield nearly every act, no matter how egregious, from any legal consequence, according to the petition. Further, the Court of Appeals and the trial courts decision rendered totally useless N.C. Gen. Stat. 90-21.5(a1) which prohibited the very acts committed by defendants. It is now a law of aspiration, with no consequence for its blatant violation.

The quoted state law NCGS 90-21.5(a1) says, Notwithstanding any other provision of law to the contrary, a health care provider shall obtain written consent from a parent or legal guardian prior to administering any vaccine that has been granted emergency use authorization and is not yet fully approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration to an individual under 18 years of age.

The Appeals Court issued a unanimous March 5 decision against the mother and son despite labeling the forced vaccination egregious.

Plaintiffs argue the trial court erred in determining that the PREP Act is applicable to this case and provides immunity to both Defendants, Judge April Wood wrote. Due to the sweeping breadth of the federal liability immunity provision in the PREP Act, we are constrained to disagree.

Bound by the broad scope of immunity provided by the PREP Act, we are constrained to hold it shields Defendants, under the facts of this case, from Plaintiffs claims relating to the administration of the COVID-19 vaccine, Wood added.

In August 2021, Smith was a 14-year-old Western Guilford High School football player. His family learned in a letter from the Guilford schools that Smith might have been affected by a COVID-19 cluster involving the team. He would not be allowed to return to practice until getting a COVID test.

Free testing would be provided at Northwest Guilford High School. The letter indicated ONS Medical Society would conduct the testing and consent for testing is required, Wood wrote.

Smiths stepfather drove him to the testing site and waited outside the building. The teenager was asked to fill out a form while a clinic worker tried unsuccessfully to contact his mother. Smith and his family didnt know the clinic also provided COVID-19 vaccine shots.

After failing to make contact with Tanners mother, one of the workers instructed the other worker to give it to him anyway. Tanner stated he did not want a vaccine and was only expecting a test, but one of the workers administered a Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine to him, Wood wrote.

Happel and Smith filed suit in August 2022. A trial judge dismissed the case in March 2023.

Appellate judges ruled that both the school board and medical society were covered by the federal PREP Act. A declaration from the secretary of the US Department of Health and Human Services in March 2020 offered protection related to the COVID-19 vaccine.

[W]e hold ONS Medical Society is a covered person as a program planner that administered a vaccine clinic, and individually administered vaccines to individuals. The declaration clearly provides that a program planner may be a private sector employer or community group when it carries out the described activities including administration of a covered countermeasure, Wood wrote.

The same law also applied to the Guilford school board. We are convinced by the Secretarys interpretation in the declaration that a covered person under the PREP Act includes a state or local government . . . [that] provides a facility to administer or use a Covered Countermeasure. We hold this language includes the Board, which provided a facility Northwest Guilford High School for the administration of the COVID-19 vaccines, Wood wrote.

Wisely or not, the plain language of the PREP Act includes claims of battery and violations of state constitutional rights within the scope of its immunity, and it therefore shields Defendants from liability for Plaintiffs claims, Wood added.

The Appeals Court noted that North Carolinas General Assembly amended state law in 2021 to require parental consent before a vaccine granted emergency use authorization may be administered to a minor.

Its intent is to prevent the egregious conduct alleged in the case before us, and to safeguard the constitutional rights at issue Emilys parental right to the care and control of her child, and Tanners right to individual liberty, Wood wrote. Notwithstanding, the statute remains explicitly subject to any other provision of law to the contrary under the broad provision preempting state law in the PREP Act.

The PREP Act provides only one exception for a Federal cause of action against a covered person for death or serious physical injury proximately caused by willful misconduct. Because Plaintiffs have not made any such allegations in their complaint, we are constrained to conclude the PREP Act preempts the protections provided by state law, Wood wrote.

Judges Allegra Collins and Jeff Carpenter joined Woods decision.

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State's high court will take up teen's forced COVID vaccination case - Carolina Journal