Category: Covid-19 Vaccine

KANSAS CITY, Mo. Healthcare technology services provider Cerner Corporation announced Friday it will require its employees to receive the COVID-19 vaccine.

The announcement comes on the first day of its new CEO, David Feinberg, taking charge of the company, which is one of the largest private employers in the Kansas City area.

A company spokesperson said all U.S.-based employees will be required to be fully vaccinated as of Dec. 8, 2021.

As part of Fridays announcement, the company delayed its re-entry date to Jan. 10, 2022.

This is a developing story and will be updated.

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Cerner to require employees to receive COVID-19 vaccine - KSHB

An Instagram post claimedthe COVID-19 vaccine from Pfizer contains an undisclosed mystery ingredient, even though the full ingredient list has been available online since December 2020.

The Sept. 20 post shows a table from the federal Food and Drug Administration titled "composition of COMIRNATY Multiple Dose Vial." Comirnaty is Pfizers brand name for its COVID-19 vaccine.

The table shows the different ingredients that make up the vaccine, according to the Instagram post. However, one of the listed ingredients, described as an excipient, is redacted.

The caption on the post claimed the excipient, a type of inert substance that acts as a vehicle for a drug, makes up 20% of the vaccine and could potentially make up 20% of each dose.

"The undisclosed ingredient is also not disclosed in the vaccine package insert," the post said. "If the American people don't know the identity of an ingredient in an FDA-approved vaccine, how is informed consent possible?"

The post was flagged as part of Facebooks efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. Instagram is owned by Facebook. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.)

Although not all the ingredients of the vaccine were shown in that FDA document, the ingredients of the vaccine are not undisclosed. They have been public since the vaccines came out.

Early version of report

The table featured in the post comes from the FDA as part of a summary report explaining its decision to give final approval to the vaccine. The report includes the studies conducted on the vaccine and an ingredient list.

Although an earlier version of the report had one ingredient redacted, as shown in the Instagram post, the FDA updated the report since the post, removing the redaction.

The formerly redacted ingredient is listed as "water for injection." (A Sept. 30 update to the Instagram post acknowledged the change.)

Pfizers vaccine is distributed in vials of a frozen suspension that must be thawed and diluted with a sterile saline solution of a certain concentration to produce several injectable doses. The table on the FDA report lists the ingredients and their amounts "after dilution."

The package insert for the vaccine lists the ingredients of the suspension and includes the dilution instructions: "Dilute the vial contents using 1.8 mL of sterile 0.9% Sodium Chloride Injection, USP to form COMIRNATY. Do not add more than 1.8 mL of diluent." The insert also details the clinical trials on the vaccine and their findings.

Redactions in FDA reports

Redactions do occur in FDA reports, and are usually for information thats considered a confidential or trade secret, said Alison Hunt, a press officer for the FDA.

The FDA report on Pfizers vaccine still has some redacted information, but Pfizer says it involves "proprietary pieces of the lipid nanoparticle that makes it unique" to the company. Lipid nanoparticles are a type of fatty material that helps transport the vaccine's active ingredient into a person's cells.

Claims that the COVID-19 vaccines contain mysterious or harmful ingredients are not new. They have been checked several times by PolitiFact, and rated False. The ingredients list for the Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson vaccines have been available online from the FDA, without redactions, since the vaccines became publicly available.

Our ruling

An Instagram post claimedthe Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine contains an undisclosed ingredient.

The post cited an FDA report in which one of the ingredients listed was redacted. The agency has since updated the file and revealed that the ingredient was water.

Long before the FDA report, the ingredients of the Pfizer vaccine, as well as ones for the Moderna and Johnson & Johnson vaccines, were made public online, without any redactions.

We rate this vaccine claim False.

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A redacted ingredient of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine is just water - PolitiFact

SAN FRANCISCO As each passing day without accepting a COVID-19 vaccine brings Andrew Wiggins closer to sitting out home games, anxious Warriors fans are hoping someone, some way, somehow, can persuade him to join his vaccinated teammates.

Wiggins will not, however, be subjected to an intervention from his most outspoken teammate.

Draymond Green is sitting this one out.

Too political, and much too personal.

I dont think no, I know Im not in any position to go tell him what he should or should not be doing, Green said Thursday. And as a leader of this team, Im not going to go to him and say, Hey, man, we really need ... No. You do what you feel. You do what you feel you want to do. Im not going go and ask him did he get a polio vaccine, so why would I go ask him if he got a COVID vaccine?

Wiggins continues to participate in the daily team activities, including controlled scrimmages. He is one of three high profile players, the others being Brooklyns Kyrie Irving and Washingtons Bradley Beal, that have resisted taking any of the available vaccines.

The City of San Francisco has mandated that all persons entering an indoor mega-event, defined as a gathering that exceeds 5,000, must be fully vaccinated. There are exceptions, and the one that relates to the Warriors is that opposing players because they are not employed within the city need not be vaccinated but must adhere to three rules, including testing, before they are permitted to play.

For Wiggins, like Irving, as a member of a team based in Brooklyn, failing to get vaccinated comes with severe consequences. No play, no pay, according to the NBA. If Wiggins remains unvaccinated when the Warriors open their home schedule on Oct. 21, he will not be allowed inside Chase Center, much less join his teammates to participate in the game.

For each game that Wiggins misses, he would forfeit roughly $385,000 in pre-tax pay. His annual salary this season, per the website Spotrac.com, is $31,579,390.

The Warriors, moreover, would be without their starting forward. Its not ideal for a team anticipating a return to the postseason, but Green, like each of Wiggins teammates to address the issue, is clear in his intention to respect Andrews decision.

Its not my place, nor my business, on whether he gets vaccinated or not or who else is vaccinated, Green said. Or if youre vaccinated and Im not, or if he isnt and she is. Thats none of my business.

Just because I am a leader of this team, that doesnt give me the right to go tell him what to do with his. Thats his personal choice.

Green, pointing out that Wiggins earlier this year became a father for the second time, said there are some affairs that take priority over the job.

That would be like me telling him, Yo, your wife is going into labor. How dare you leave this team? Green said. Thats something thats personal to him, something thats health-related, something thats personal to his family.

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Draymond Green won't tell Andrew Wiggins to get COVID-19 vaccine - NBC Sports Bay Area

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic spread worldwide in 2019, causing a global health and economic crisis. The rapid transmission of the disease combined with the high death rates in at-risk groups led to millions of deaths, and many countries introducing social distancing measures, lockdowns, and other restrictions.

Study: The impact of SARS-CoV-2 vaccination on Alpha and Delta variant transmission. Image Credit: BaLL LunLa/ Shutterstock

Recently with the help of mass vaccination schemes, drug repurposing programs, and monoclonal antibodies, the pandemic has begun to be brought under control. However, worries are rising over variants of concern, such as the Delta variant, which is known to avoid both vaccine-induced and natural immunity.

Due to the increased threat posed by the variant, researchers from the University of Oxford have been examining the impact of vaccination on the spread of the Alpha and Delta variants through the population.

A preprint version of the study is available on the medRxiv* server while the article undergoes peer review.

The researchers used national contact testing data from England to examine the rate of transmission for the variants. They performed a retrospective observational cohort study of contacts of both symptomatic and asymptomatic convalescent individuals. The scientists only included results from those who had contact with an infected individual proved with a PCR test who then took a PCR test themselves within 1-10 days. They also only included cases from three laboratories, as they all used the same standardized procedure looking for the S gene encoding for the spike protein, the N gene encoding for the nucleocapsid, or the ORF1ab target.

Vaccination details for individuals meeting these criteria were then obtained from the national immunization database. The results of these tests estimated the specific strain the Alpha strain will show a negative result for the S gene but positive results for the rest. Any full set of results before the 10th of May 2021 was considered to be for the original strain. Still, given the prevalence of the Alpha and Delta strains following this date, any non-Alpha positive test was assumed to be Delta.

Multivariable logistic regression was used to examine the transmission from the original positive test the index case to other contacts. This technique is often used to examine a series of predictor variables, which in this case were vaccine status, type of vaccine, contact event type, age, sex, symptoms, local prevalence of COVID-19, and local deprivation, to return a dichotomous result. Natural cubic splines and log transformation helped to account for non-linearity.

In total, nearly 100,000 index cases with a positive PCR test were identified, and over 150,000 positive contacts. Twelve thousand six hundred fifty-seven of these contacts had to be excluded due to incomplete information. Fifty-one thousand seven hundred ninety-eight of the remaining contacts tested positive. Ages ranged from 26-50 and were roughly split between men (44%) and women (56%). 70% of contact events were within the same household, with the rest evenly split between visitors, events, and work/education.

The vast majority of positive contacts were from unvaccinated individuals (49%). Around 27% were partially vaccinated, and the remaining 23% were partially vaccinated. These figures are for the ChADOx1 vaccination individuals; BNT162b2 cases showed small differences but followed roughly the same pattern.

Multivariable models showed that double vaccination for either vaccine significantly reduced the odds of infection for the Alpha strain, with BNT162b2 potentially providing a small amount of extra protection following either one or two doses.

The Delta variant showed increased transmission from the index case compared to Alpha for both asymptomatic and symptomatic individuals. Outside of vaccine status, other factors that were positively associated with a positive test were contact event type, age, the index case and the contact being different sexes, higher deprivation index, and higher local severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) incidence.

These findings are supported by previous studies showing higher risk for more deprived individuals, as well as up to a 12-fold lower antibody response from vaccinated individuals to the Delta strain as compared to the original strain found in Wuhan.

The authors highlight the importance of their results in showcasing the increased danger of the variants of concern, particularly considering the relatively high cases of double-vaccinated individuals who still tested positive for COVID-19. These results could be very important in informing public health policy.

medRxiv publishes preliminary scientific reports that are not peer-reviewed and, therefore, should not be regarded as conclusive, guide clinical practice/health-related behavior, or treated as established information.

Journal reference:

Eyre, D. et al. (2021) "The impact of SARS-CoV-2 vaccination on Alpha and Delta variant transmission". medRxiv. doi: 10.1101/2021.09.28.21264260.

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The extent to which COVID-19 vaccination reduces transmission varies with vaccine type and SARS-CoV-2 strain - News-Medical.Net

Only a day after details were revealed, Republican leaders in the Ohio House of Representatives attempted Wednesday to voteouta bill that would establish exemptions for COVID-19 vaccine mandates imposed by employers and schools.

Instead, it was never brought up for a vote in the first place.

"Members wanted to take a little more time to consider some of the provisions andnew ideas surfaced. And so we're just taking a little more time to consider, Ohio House Speaker Bob Cupp, R-Lima, told reporters.

House Bill 435,sponsored by Rep. Bill Seitz, R-Green Township, and Rep. Rick Carfagna, R-Genoa Township, was given special priority by GOP leadership, who were rushing to pass it out without public testimony.

But the short timeframe was criticized by multiple lawmakers and groups. Carfagna had said there's been plenty enough testimony on vaccine mandates in hearings of other vaccine bills.

Another possible reason for the delay, though Cupp said it wasn't a factor: interest groups from both sides who announced they opposed the leadership's proposal.

The bill was meant to offer an alternative approach to complete bans on vaccine mandates, to help appease hospital and business groups. The influential Ohio Chamber of Commerce has opposed past bills telling businesses what they can or cannot do.

On Wednesday, the chamber made clear it opposed House Bill 435.Hospital groups also remain opposed to the bill, saying the approach still derailed efforts fighting the virus.

"House Bill 435 infringes upon the rights of Ohios employers. One-size-fits-all government mandates limiting employer rights are not the right approach, the Chambersaid in a written statement.

But advocates against vaccine mandates didn't like how rushed it was as well, andsaidit didn't go far enough.

"SUB HB435 does not prevent mandates," wrote Health Freedom Ohio on Facebook.

Cupp said that House leadership would "immediately" go back to the drawing board to see what methods are to be pursued.

Despite the speed,details ofHB435 were already undergoing scrutiny.

Under the bill, private and public schools and employers can mandate the COVID-19 shot, but only ones fully approved by the Food and Drug Administration. The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is currently the only one; others are still under emergency authorization.

Anybody can be exempt from the requirement for reasons of conscience, medical reasons or "natural immunity," defined as"presence of COVID-19 antibodies in an amount at least equal to those conferred by a COVID-19 vaccine."

Rep. Beth Liston, D-Dublin, noted there's no medical standard on proving immunity effectiveness from antibodies from previous COVID-19 infections. Whether immunity from infection is effective as vaccine immunity is still unclear.

Some also questioned how flexible the exemptions are. For those choosing a conscience exemption, for example,one only would need a written statement saying such and couldn't be questioned further.

Seitz said he hopes people exempting themselves are "doing so in good faith," comparing having peoplequestioned further about their religion or beliefs to the Spanish Inquisition.

Not everybody can get exemptions. Those working in children's hospitals and hospital intensive care units can't, and Democrats questioned why other health care settings weren't included, too.

Carfagna responded that many children aren't eligible for the vaccine and ICUs tend to have the most vulnerable patients, so that's why they were singled out.

"Hopefully other health care settings are mostly already vaccinated by now," he said.

Republicans had questions as well, asking why all employees hired after the bill's effective date would not be eligible for exemptions.

Carfagna said that's because a job hunter should already knowthat vaccination is or isn't a work requirement before accepting the job offer. On the other hand, currently employed people saw their work conditions change whentheir bossesbegan requiring vaccinations.

Quite a few conservatives have said the bill doesn't go far enough in protecting "medical freedom."

"When a weak bill is passed, the momentum is lost, and then whenever a conservative representative tries to do anything further on the issue, leadership tells them, 'we already passed a bill about that,'" wrote Rep. Nino Vitale, R-Urbana, in his newsletter.

Titus Wu is a reporter for the USA TODAY Network Ohio Bureau, which serves the Columbus Dispatch, Cincinnati Enquirer, Akron Beacon Journal and 18 other affiliated news organizations across Ohio.

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Ohio GOP leaders wanted a fast vote granting exemptions for COVID-19 vaccine mandates. They got pushback - The Columbus Dispatch

CLARKSVILLE, TN (CLARKSVILLE NOW) All the employees at the TVA Cumberland Fossil Plant will be required to get the COVID-19 vaccine in the coming weeks.

The details are being worked out, but TVA spokesman Scott Fielder confirmed to Clarksville Now that all TVA employees must be fully vaccinated by Nov. 22. That includes the estimated 180 employees of the TVA plant in Cumberland City, about 25 miles southwest of Clarksville on Highway 149.

The requirement is in response to President Joe Bidens order earlier this month that all federal employees must get COVID-19 vaccine.

After reviewing the recently issued Executive Order and additional guidance received from the Safer Federal Workforce Task Force for federal employees, TVA employees will be required to be fully vaccinated for COVID-19 by November 22, 2021, according to a TVA statement provided by Fielder.

TVA has consistently encouraged our workforce to become vaccinated since vaccines became available to them, as this offers the best protection against serious illness. We are currently working on developing the specific processes and procedures needed to implement this new requirement, including the development of a secure system through which employees will document their vaccination status, the statement said.

Employees will be updated as new information becomes available, he said.

Until then, TVAs current COVID-19 protection protocols will remain in place. Those include:

WKRN, Channel 2 in Nashville contributed to this report.

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TVA employees in Cumberland City will have to get COVID-19 vaccine | ClarksvilleNow.com - Clarksville Now

Globally, were in a race to vaccinate the world against COVID-19. Were moving into the winter months across the Northern Hemisphere, there is increasing concern regarding COVID-19 transmission over this winter. Colder months drive people indoors, holiday travels, and children are back in schoolall things that can help spread respiratory viruses, like COVID-19.

In the United States, 55.4% of the population is fully vaccinated. Meaning, we still have a lot of work to do, especially when we consider the latest recommendations for boosters for those over 65 years of age, more vulnerable to severe disease, or those working in high-risk professions. The COVID-19 vaccines have been amazingly effective against severe illness and death, but nonetheless the question of ability to prevent infection and reduce transmission has been a huge topic of discussion. As we move into a period of boosters and longer immunity, were still working to understand hospitalizations and deaths in adults after being vaccinated.

A new study published in The BMJ breaks down the risk prediction of death or hospitalization related to COVID-19 in adults following their vaccination. In a national prospective cohort study, the research team assessed adults 18-100 years of age from December 2020 to June 2021 who were vaccinated. Drawing on primary outcomes of death and hospital admission, they reviewed such data 14 days after each vaccination dose (one or two doses). The authors noted that over 6.9 million vaccinated patients were studied in the cohort, with over 5.1 million having two vaccine doses. In this group. 2031 COVID-19 associated deaths occurred and 1929 hospitalizations were related to COVID-19. Of those vaccinated and 14 or more days after vaccination, 81 deaths occurred, and 71 hospital admissions occurred. The authors noted that Cause specific hazard ratios were highest for patients with Downs syndrome (12.7-fold increase), kidney transplantation (8.1-fold), sickle cell disease (7.7-fold), care home residency (4.1-fold), chemotherapy (4.3-fold), HIV/AIDS (3.3-fold), liver cirrhosis (3.0-fold), neurological conditions (2.6-fold), recent bone marrow transplantation or a solid organ transplantation ever (2.5-fold), dementia (2.2-fold), and Parkinsons disease (2.2-fold). Other conditions with increased risk (ranging from 1.2-fold to 2.0-fold increases) included chronic kidney disease, blood cancer, epilepsy, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, coronary heart disease, stroke, atrial fibrillation, heart failure, thromboembolism, peripheral vascular disease, and type 2 diabetes. A similar pattern of associations was seen for covid-19 related hospital admissions. No evidence indicated that associations differed after the second dose, although absolute risks were reduced.

This particularly study is important in risk stratification in regards to multiple doses of COVID-19 vaccines and helped provide insight into those at highest risk for disease and death after vaccination, which is something were increasingly in need of as we navigate the winter and topics of boosters. In this interim, its important we increase access to vaccines globally and break through barriers that prevent people from having easy access to vaccination. Moreover, until we have global vaccine equity, the threat of variants will continue, meaning that as we study the long-term protection of vaccines, we need to continue to mask in high-risk environments and help reduce the threat of infection.

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Hospitalization, Death, and COVID-19 Vaccinations - Contagionlive.com

Passenger removed after asking flight attendant to wear face mask

A man was removed from an Allegiant Air flight Monday morning to Punta Gorda, Florida after allegedly asking a flight attendant to put a face mask on, according to a report by Newsweek. (Credit: Anonymous via Storyful)

WASHINGTON - California Sen. Dianne Feinstein has proposed a bill that would require all U.S. domestic airline passengers to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19, test negative for the virus, or show proof that they have fully recovered from the illness.

Feinstein introduced the U.S. Air Travel Public Safety Act Wednesday that would require the Secretary of Health and Human Services, along with the FAA, to develop standards and procedures to prevent a COVID-19 outbreak regarding air travel.

The proposed bill would also require an advisory committee with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to make recommendations for COVID-19 vaccine use in health care settings and among health care staff in other settings.

RELATED: United, Frontier roll out COVID-19 vaccination requirements for workers

"We know that air travel during the 2020 holiday season contributed to last winters devastating COVID-19 surge," Feinstein said in a news release. "We simply cannot allow that to happen again."

"Ensuring that air travelers protect themselves and their destination communities from this disease is critical to prevent the next surge, particularly if we confront new, more virulent variants of COVID-19," she continued.

A Southwest Airlines flight attendant has filed a lawsuit against the carrier, claiming the airline failed to follow proper COVID-19 protocols to protect its staff from being exposed to the coronavirus during a mandatory training session last summer, which led to her husbands death.

Some airlines have already mandated that employees receive a COVID-19 vaccine.

United Airlines said it will begin terminating the employment of workers who have declined to get a COVID-19 vaccine in violation of the companys policy.

RELATED: United Airlines to fire 593 employees who refused COVID-19 vaccine

In a memo obtained by FOX TV Stations, the company wrote that more than 99% of its 90,000-plus workforce has gotten vaccinated.

A United Airlines spokesperson confirmed the company has already begun a process to terminate the employment of 593 people who have chosen not to comply with the companys vaccine requirement policy.

RELATED: These companies are requiring employees to get COVID-19 vaccinations

Frontier Airlines followed suit, announcing a similar policy requiring employees to be vaccinated by Oct. 1 or provide "regular" proof of a negative COVID-19 test.

Airlines continue to grapple with mandated COVID-19 restrictions as travel rebounds from the 2020 global lockdown.

Federal officials extended into January a requirement that people on flights and public transportation wear face masks, a rule intended to limit the spread of COVID-19.

The mask mandate has been controversial and has led to many encounters between passengers who dont want to wear a mask and flight attendants asked to enforce the rule. The FAA said in August that airlines have reported 3,889 incidents involving unruly passengers this year, and 2,867 or 74% involved refusing to wear a mask.

Austin Williams and the Associated Press contributed to this report. This story was reported from Los Angeles.

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Bill would require US airline passengers to have COVID-19 vaccine or prove negative test - FOX 29 News Philadelphia

Director of the Pan American Health Organization Carissa Etienne speaks to media about policies to deal with the Zika virus, in Montevideo February 3, 2016. REUTERS/Andres Stapff

MEXICO CITY, Sept 29 (Reuters) - The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) said on Wednesday it is in advanced talks with vaccine makers to buy additional COVID-19 shots for its member states to complement bilateral deals, donations, and doses they are receiving via the COVAX mechanism.

PAHO has reached an agreement with Chinese vaccine maker Sinovac, and is expecting to sign new accords soon to buy vaccines with emergency use listing approval from other suppliers for 2021 and 2022, PAHO Director Carissa Etienne said.

"PAHO has helped COVAX deliver 50 million doses to our region, including nearly 14 million donated doses, and we have the capacity to quickly scale this support, so we urge countries not to delay their donations as lives hang in the balance today," said Etienne.

The agreement with Sinovac is to buy 8.5 million vaccine doses for 2021 and some 80 million doses next year, said Jarbas Barbosa, assistant director of PAHO, the regional branch of the World Health Organization (WHO).

"We are in negotiations with all the producers who have emergency use authorization from the WHO ... and we are in fairly advanced negotiations to probably sign this week or next week with two other producers who have offered vaccines for the last quarter of 2021 and for 2022," said Barbosa.

Over a billion COVID-19 vaccine doses have been administered in the Americas and 35% of people in Latin America and the Caribbean have been fully vaccinated, but stressed that coverage has not been uniform, said Etienne.

Canada, Chile, Uruguay, and Puerto Rico have fully vaccinated over 70% of their populations, while 10 countries and territories in the region have yet to vaccinate 20% of their populations and Haiti has inoculated less than 1% of its people.

Last week the Americas saw nearly 1.5 million new infections and more than 26,000 COVID-19 related deaths, more than any other global region, according to PAHO figures.

Reporting by Anthony Esposito and Adriana Barrera; editing by Diane Craft

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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PAHO says in advanced talks to buy more COVID-19 vaccines - Reuters

As the Dallas Mavericks season nears, one player has admitted to not being vaccinated against COVID-19.

Guard Trey Burke told reporters after practice on Wednesday that he has yet to receive the vaccination.

The NBA released tentative health and safety protocols to its teams Tuesday, detailing how players who havent gotten the COVID-19 vaccination will be tested far more often than their vaccinated colleagues and face a slew of other restrictions.

Click here to read more on this story from our partners at The Dallas Morning News.

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Mavericks Guard Trey Burke Says He Has Not Received COVID-19 Vaccination - NBC 5 Dallas-Fort Worth