Category: Covid-19

The COVID-19 pandemic shock was unparalleled in modern history. The strict containment measures, with broad economic consequences, called for a quick governmental response. European governments swiftly enacted policies to support businesses and households on a scale and magnitude never seen before. The discussion of support mechanisms and their intended and unintended macroeconomic effects has naturally found its place in economic literature.

Evidence based on data on French firms (Coeur 2021) suggested that the pandemic government support sharply reduced the number of insolvent or failing companies. Van der Wielen et al. (2021) analysed data from an EU-wide survey among firms and confirmed that the COVID-19 support successfully reached the firms that suffered the most in terms of pandemic-induced revenue reductions and it avoided a liquidity dry-out and freezing of the corporate ecosystem.

Bighelli et al. (2021) argued that the COVID-19 government support has not been as unproductively distributed as feared. The subsidies were distributed towards medium-productivity firms, and only marginally towards the undeserving zombies, in several euro area countries. Rodano et al. (2022) confirmed for Italy that zombie firms were less likely than healthy firms to access public support measures.

The Expert Group on Productivity, Innovation and Technological Change, which includes a team of experts from the European System of Central Banks (ESCB), conducted an analysis of the short- and long-term impacts of the pandemic, including the containment measures and policy support, on EU productivity trends. Their work (summarised in Lalinsky et al. 2024) relied on the analysis of aggregate, sector and a large micro-distributed dataset including data from 12 euro area countries.

In this column, we show a subset of results of the expert group focusing on the distribution of the pandemic policy support, and how it changed over time, across firms of different productivity levels. The reason to focus on this particular aspect is its potential implications for aggregate productivity growth: if policy support unintendedly helped the survival of low-productivity firms, and thereby contributed to resource misallocation, aggregate productivity would be negatively affected over the short and medium term.

We document declining efficiency of the allocation of employment subsidies to firms with respect to their productivity. The analysis starts with a description of the overall evolution of the support to corporates over time, continues with the distribution of the support to different productivity clusters, and finally investigates whether the probability to receive subsidies and their size changed over time.

Although, the spread of the COVID-19 virus and its impact differed across countries, European governments responded with support to firms on a colossal scale. The employment support, provided mostly on a monthly basis, on average followed the stringency of the policies to mitigate the impact of the pandemic on public health and society. As suggested by Figure 1 showing aggregate developments for our sample countries, both the size of support and number of supported firms peaked in the first wave of the pandemic, when the implementation of lockdowns, social distancing measures, and other measures to curb the spread of the virus resulted in significant drops in sales affecting a large share of businesses, including financially healthy and viable ones.

Although firm eligibility was not initially directly connected to the stringency of the policy measure to curb the virus, the employment support started to rise again in October 2020, shortly after the onset of the second wave of COVID-19. It peaked again in the first months of 2021. The support then gradually declined and was suspended for some time in the summer of 2021 in several countries. Further months with somewhat increased spread of the virus and stringency measures saw only mild increases in the employment subsidies, as the severity of the COVID-19 virus declined and the ability to deal with the health and economic consequences improved.

Figure 1 The scale of support and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic

In what follows, we study the distribution of the wage subsidies one of the main instruments to support firms liquidity across firms of different productivity levels in three steps. First, we divide firms into quintiles based on their productivity relative to the productivity of the rest of firms operating in the same country, and analyse the aggregate values of subsidies allocated to each of the quintiles. Next, we analyse how the probability of receiving subsidies varied depending on firm characteristics, and in particular firm productivity (the extensive margin). Lastly, focusing on those firms which received support, we analyse the correlation between the amount of support granted to each firm and its productivity (the intensive margin). For details of our regressions, see Labinsky et al. (2024).

In 2020, almost one-third of wage subsidies were allocated to firms in the top 20% of the pre-pandemic productivity distribution. Firms with above-median productivity received about two-thirds of all subsidies, i.e. significantly more than their proportional share. Only a small share of subsidies went to non-productive firms, defined as firms in the lowest quintile of the productivity distribution.

The allocation of wage subsidies changed in 2021. The distribution of support shifted towards less productive firms, as shown in Figure 2. The share of subsidies allocated to high-productivity firms declined. To better understand the drivers of these developments, we apply regression analysis to disentangle the role of the extensive and intensive margins.

Figure 2 Share of support allocated to firm productivity quintiles, 2020 and 2021

Di Mauro et al. (2021) demonstrated a non-linear relationship between the likelihood of receiving support and firm productivity. They found that firms around the median of the productivity distribution had the highest probability of receiving support in 2020. Our research confirms this relationship for a broader group of countries which extend beyond the Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) region analysed in their work. Although the degree of non-linearity and the magnitude of marginal gains vary among individual countries, on average firms from the 6th decile of productivity had about a 15% greater chance of being supported than firms from the bottom 10% of the productivity distribution.

As illustrated in Figure 3, the correlation between the probability of receiving support and firm productivity weakened during the second year of the pandemic. The reason was that high-productivity firms exited the supporting schemes earlier and, therefore, the relative probability of low-productivity firms being supported increased. Note that these results are based on data for Croatia, Latvia, and Slovakia, the only three countries with available data for 2021 at the time of writing the report. However, given that results were very similar across all countries in 2020, and that results for 2021 are similar across the three countries with data, we think this development may have been similar in other euro area countries as well.

Figure 3 Firm probability of receiving support by productivity, 2020 and 2021

Turning to the intensive margin, as documented in Figure 4, in the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic the amount of support increased almost linearly with firm productivity. Specifically, firms in the highest productivity decile received wage subsidies that were approximately 40% larger than those awarded to firms in the lowest productivity decile.

However, this relationship significantly weakened in 2021. The difference in the size of support allocated to high- and low-productivity firms became negligible, and firms with medium productivity levels received only about 10% more support than the least productive ones. This suggests a significant shift in the distribution of support towards less productive firms.

Figure 4 Size of support by productivity, 2020 and 2021

The main findings of the micro-distributed analysis presented in this column confirm that the allocation of pandemic-related wage subsidies in 2020 was efficient. This means that more productive firms were more likely than less productive firms to receive support; and received more support in absolute terms. However, not only the total volume of support, but also the allocation across firms evolved over time. We find that the link between firm productivity and policy support weakened in the second year of the pandemic. The reason is that more productive firms recovered more rapidly and were, in consequence, quicker to leave the government support schemes, which increased the probability of low-productivity firms receiving support. Our research, based on data for euro area firms, confirms and complements earlier findings of Bahar et al. (2021) suggesting that the support initially protected productive firms in temporary need and contributed positively to aggregate productivity, but as the economy recovered, the supporting schemes became more distortive.

Authors note: The results presented in this column are the result of a close and unique cooperation among several country teams from the euro area National Central Banks and the ECB within the WGF Expert group on productivity, innovation and technological change. We namely thank Konstantins Benkovskis, Olegs Krasnopjorovs, Josip Raos and Domagoj elebaj for their contributions. Paloma Lopez-Garcia coordinated the WGF Expert group on productivity, innovation and technological change. Tibor Lalinsky coordinated the Workstream on COVID-19 and productivity and all micro-distributed exercises.

Bahar, E, J Hambur and D Andrews (2021), COVID-19, job retention schemes and productivity: From supportive to distortive, VoxEU.org, 30 September

di Mauro, F, T Bighelli and T Lalinsky (2021), "Covid-19 government support may have not been as unproductively distributed as feared", VoxEU.org, 19 August.

Coeur, B (2021), What 3.5 million French firms can tell us about the efficiency of Covid-19 support measures, VoxEU.org, 8 September.

Hale, T, N Angrist, R, Goldszmidt et al. (2021), A global panel database of pandemic policies (Oxford COVID-19 Government Response Tracker), Nature Human Behaviour 5: 529538.

Lalinsky, T, M Anastasatou, S Anyfantaki et al. (2024), The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and policy support on productivity: a report by the ESCB expert group on productivity, innovation and technological change, ECB Occasional Paper Series No 341.

Rodano, G, E Sette and M Pelosi (2022), Zombie firms and the take-up of support measures during Covid-19, VoxEU.org, 4 May.

Van der Wielen, W, D Revoltella, L Maurin, R Pl and P Harasztosi (2021), Firm-level policy support during the Covid-19 crisis: So far so good, VoxEU.org, 18 November.

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COVID-19 policy support and firm productivity in retrospect - CEPR

TOPSHOT - A memorial for Dr Li Wenliang, who was the whistleblower of the Coronavirus, Covid-19, ... [+] that originated in Wuhan, China and caused the doctors death in that city, is pictured outside the UCLA campus in Westwood, California, on February 15, 2020. - The death toll from the new coronavirus outbreak surpassed 1,600 in China on Sunday, with the first fatality reported outside Asia fuelling global concerns. (Photo by Mark RALSTON / AFP) (Photo by MARK RALSTON/AFP via Getty Images)

China abandoned its zero-COVID program in December 2022. Travel restrictions were lifted. Quarantines ended. The government stopped testing, stopped even collecting data related to COVID, and declared victory.

Many Western experts, taking it at face value, expected an economic boom. Typical was a February 2023 article in The Economist entitled What Pandemic? Chinas Ultra-Fast Economic Recovery. China, so they said, was back with a vengeance. The authors claimed to discern evidence of a surprisingly rapid consumer revival in the worlds second-biggest economy a trend so strong that the countrys reopening will boost global growth, perhaps uncomfortably.

True, the concrete indicia were sketchy. The Economist cited record attendance at a mausoleum (ambiguous?), and long lines waiting to catch cable cars at a popular tourist site. (Not typical metrics of economic performance.) Optimism rested in large part on the unusually liquid status of Chinese households, with savings greater than 100% of the countrys GDP, purportedly ready to drive a spending boom. The gung-ho account described the frenetic pace of revenge spending; a spree; and a splurge that will make a welcome contribution to global growth.

Paeans to the Great Chinese Growth Engine flooded the media. Released from the zero-COVID cage, the Chinese economy would roar back to business as usual. Even the sober folks at the Federal Reserve bought into it.

BusinessWeeks contribution was titled Welcome Back: China Rejoins the Party. It would be good news for the rest of us, too the easing of COVID restrictions may be the boost the flagging world economy needs.

[A passing comment a buildup of savings is often not seen as a sign of economic health, as economists since Keynes have realized. See Martin Wolfs commentary in The Financial Times from March 5 of this year Chinas Excess Savings Are A Danger.]

In any case, within months it was becoming clear that the projected recovery was not taking place.

The end of zero-COVID was not the end of COVID. Infections in China exploded, affecting more than a billion people in just a few weeks. No other country has experienced so many COVID cases in such a short period of time. The healthcare system was completely overwhelmed. And as a June 2023 report in Nature magazine warned

Assessing the full medical, social, and economic impact of the pandemic in China starts with understanding the true toll on the Chinese population. Massive outbreaks in other places (e.g., New Zealand, Singapore, and Hong Kong) following the end of zero-COVID policies offer analogies for what China is experiencing, but the surge there is much larger and more intense.

How much larger? It is hard to say. Chinese government statistics on COVID are useless (The Economists assessment), for reasons described in the previous column. But other types of government data can be used to estimate the true death toll, at least to a reasonable order of magnitude.

How many Chinese have died? Official and unofficial accounts diverge.

Beijings message has been triumphalist.

On the other hand

Chinas active suppression of COVID data makes it impossible to answer this question directly. Incidental data sources (such as the sudden and acute shortages of pharmaceutical products, or satellite images of clogged roadways and parking lots near funeral homes and crematoriums in Chinese cities) suggest the scale of the problem. But they do not easily translate into hard number estimates.

Analysts have used three main approaches to assess the true impact of COVID in China.

This is the most straightforward approach, and arguably the most convincing. It relies entirely on official Chinese government figures.

Death rates are generally very stable. In most countries today, the crude death rate from all causes rises gently as the population ages. Excess mortality is defined as a significant upward deviation from the long-term trend.

Beginning in 2019, China experienced a sudden and significant inflection in the crude death rate. The multi-year average rate of annual increase jumps by a factor of five and remains elevated.

Crude Death Rates in China 2009-2023

The total over four years from 2019-2022 amounts to about 1.6 million excess deaths. (2023 added another 800,000 excess deaths above the pre-COVID baseline.)

Surplus Deaths in China 2019-2022

The Economist magazine has modeled excess mortality extensively and with technical sophistication. As of July 2023, their model produced estimates of between 560,000 and 3.7 million excess deaths in China, with a central best estimate of just under 2 million deaths (roughly in line with my simple estimate provided above).

Excess Mortality in China 2020-2023, As Modeled By The Economist Magazine

The most recent assessment of excess mortality comes from an article published in the Journal of the American Medical Association on August 24, 2023.

In summary, it is clear that COVID-19 struck China hard, starting in 2019, and persisting over the past four years. The crude death rate skyrocketed, reflecting millions of excess deaths above the normal long-term trend.

This approach relies on observed ratios for infection and mortality in other countries (comparables) where COVID data is more complete and of higher quality. These ratios are then applied to the Chinese population to derive an estimate of the likely impact there.

Strong comparables would combine: (1) similar cultural and ethnic background; (2) similar economic systems; (3) similar zero-COVID regimes; and (4) more reliable data.

Hong Kong is the best case for comparison. The city maintained a zero-COVID regime (albeit less stringent than that on the mainland) until February 2022, when it was overwhelmed by Omicron. In March 2022, the British Medical Journal wrote:

In the 12 months following the breakdown of Hong Kongs zero-COVID regime, the cumulative COVID death count in Hong Kong increased by over 6000 percentfrom 213 to 13,370. (The increase in the U.S. over the same period was 22 percent.) This is evidence for the catastrophic impact of the Omicron variant on a poorly prepared population, It underscores the point that the return-to-zero in Chinas reported daily death rate after March 2023 is epidemiologically impossible. Applying Hong Kongs mortality rate of 184 COVID deaths per 100,000 population to Chinas population of roughly 1.4 billion people would yield an estimate of about 2.5 million deaths, which is in line with the excess mortality figures cited above.

A Stanford University study modeled Chinas death count based on Hong Kong and Korean experiences resulted in lower estimates: 987,455 and 619,549 maximal COVID-19 deaths, respectively, assuming the entire China population was infected. Leaked official Chinese reports indicate that infection rates for the Chinese population reached 80 percent to 90 percent within a few weeks after the lifting of zero-COVID in December 2022.

There are important differences, however, between China and even the closest comparables, which point to a more severe impact for China. These aggravating factors include:

Ultimately, estimates based on the comparables approach are roughly in line with estimates based on excess mortality, and are five to 30 times higher than the official COVID death count published by the Chinese government.

COVID rates for China can also be estimated from various public data sources that partially and/or indirectly correlate COVID mortality. In February 2023, The New York Times reported on the results of a number of different modeling approaches, which converged in an estimate of 1 million to 1.5 million Chinese deaths through the end of 2022, and before the real impact of the lifting of zero-COVID (again in line with the excess mortality calculations described in the previous section.) A Chinese-led study extrapolated from the Shanghai outbreak in Spring 2022 and estimated 1.6 million deaths by mid-2023.

Airfinity, a health data analytics group, modeled 600,000 deaths in the first month after the lifting of zero-COVID10 times Chinas official figure during the same time periodand 1.7 million deaths by April 2023. The Seattle-based Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation forecast about 300,000 deaths in China from the end of zero-COVID through the first quarter of 2023. (This model has been widely criticized as prone to significant underestimates for many countries, and updating was paused at the end of 2022. Even so, its final forecast was 100 percent higher than the official Chinese figures.)

And as noted earlier, The Economists figure for COVID deaths is about 2 million (central estimate) as of July 2023 1500 percent higher than the official death tolls.

Chinas zero-COVID policy effectively meant zero reporting of COVID. The suppression of data began early and instinctively, and became the fixed official policy in April 2020. It did not really change even after zero-COVID was lifted in December 2022. Zero reporting continues to this day. The most basic data are apparently no longer even being collected.

Consideration of anomalies in the raw mortality figures, infection rates, and case-fatality rates all show impossibly low figures for China compared to other countries with similar demographic and policy profiles. Hong Kongs infection rate is 143 times higher than the infection rate reported for the Chinese Mainland, and the mortality rate is 30 times higher than the mainlands reported rate.

In particular, the extremely low reported Case-Fatality Rate (CFR) reported by China (described in the previous column) 33 times lower than the CFR of Hong Kong is medically inconceivable. The fate of an infected person in Mainland China cannot have been very different from that of a COVID victim in Hong Kong or anywhere else. In fact, the institutional deficits in Chinas healthcare system would imply less effective treatment of COVID patients compared to Hong Kong or Korea.

The number of Chinese killed by COVID was likely between 1.5 and 2 million through mid-2023, with estimates ranging up to 3.5 million at the high end. The number who became seriously ill would have been in the tens of millions, stressing the healthcare system, diverting resources from productive uses, and hobbling the economy. Because of Beijings active suppression of the key data, it may never be possible to completely isolate and quantify the effects of this factor, but it must be accounted one of the major contributors to Chinas current slowdown.

A delivery man walks past a mall at a business district in Beijing on May 16, 2022. - China's retail ... [+] sales slumped to its lowest in two years while factory output plunged, official data showed on May 16, capturing the dismal economic fallout from Beijing's zero-Covid policy. (Photo by AFP) (Photo by STR/AFP via Getty Images)

For more information, see Part 1 of this essay, here:

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The Missing Factor In Explanations Of China's Economic Distress: COVID Part 2: Estimating The True Death Toll - Forbes

A new study has disentangled the risks to infants and birth parents from infection with SARS-CoV-2the virus that causes COVID-19 from risks related to broader societal changes during the pandemic period.

Led by Dr. Shelley Jung, a UC Berkeley School of Public Health researcher, and published today in JAMA Network Open, the article shows that COVID-19 infection was associated with increased risk of preterm birth, hypertension, and severe maternal morbiditywhich the CDC defines as unexpected outcomes of labor and delivery that result in significant short- or long-term consequences to a womans health. Interestingly, the pandemic period itself was associated with a lower risk of preterm birth, but a higher risk of hypertension and gestational diabetes.

This is the first study to separate the infant and birth parent risks linked to the pre-pandemic period, the societal changes of the pandemic period, and individual COVID-19 infection. As far as we know, ours is the first within one coherent set of data to pull these three groups apart, said Dr. Jennifer Ahern, a UC Berkeley epidemiology professor and the papers senior author.

The societal changes that may have affected health included differential access to care, economic strain, physical inactivity, and other stressors.

It was an extremely stressful time for people for a variety of reasons, said Ahern. There were the economic impacts, which were pretty substantial, people losing jobs and sources of income.

Jung noted that while COVID-19 infections had negative effects, the pandemic did also bring some positive impact.

Youve got maybe less commute stress, less physical stress during pregnancy, she said. Its just a very complex set of changes that all coincided. It was exciting to dig into the net effect of the period on the people of California. This study examined statewide California data, individually linking all birth and hospital discharge records for 2019 to 2020. We linked the birth records to the hospital records, Jung said. Then we looked nine months back at the birth parents pregnancy and looked at all the hospital visits during those nine months.

Ahern praised the state of California for coordinating data sources and making them available through a rigorous process that she said allows for valuable research while also protecting patient privacy.

The team will move on to look not just at the overall effect of the COVID pandemic period on the population, but how COVID may affect health disparities.

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New study differentiates perinatal risks of COVID-19 infection from pandemic era societal changes - UC Berkeley School of Public Health

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Oregon prisoner who received compassionate release during COVID-19 returned to life of crime within days - The Bulletin

FILE PHOTO: Nurse practitioner Sarah Gonzalez prepares to give a dose of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) Moderna vaccine at a mass vaccination site at Brooklyn Army Terminal in New York City, New York, January 10, 2021. File photo by Andrew Kelly/Reuters

GENEVA (AP) After the coronavirus pandemic triggered once-unthinkable lockdowns, upended economies and killed millions, leaders at the World Health Organization and worldwide vowed to do better in the future. Years later, countries are still struggling to come up with an agreed-upon plan for how the world might respond to the next global outbreak.

READ MORE: Biden administration announces strategy to combat future pandemics with 50 country partnership

A ninth and final round of talks involving governments, advocacy groups and others to finalize a "pandemic treaty" is scheduled to end Friday. The accord's aim: guidelines for how the WHO's 194 member countries might stop future pandemics and better share scarce resources. But experts warn there are virtually no consequences for countries that don't comply.

WHO's countries asked the U.N. health agency to oversee talks for a pandemic agreement in 2021. Envoys have been working long hours in recent weeks to prepare a draft ahead of a self-imposed deadline later this month: ratification of the accord at WHO's annual meeting. But deep divisions could derail it.

U.S. Republican senators wrote a letter to the Biden administration last week critical of the draft for focusing on issues like "shredding intellectual property rights" and "supercharging the WHO." They urged Biden not to sign off.

Britain's department of health said it would only agree to an accord if it was "firmly in the U.K. national interest and respects national sovereignty."

And many developing countries say it's unfair that they might be expected to provide virus samples to help develop vaccines and treatments, but then be unable to afford them.

"This pandemic treaty is a very high-minded pursuit, but it doesn't take political realities into account," said Sara Davies, a professor of international relations at Griffith University in Australia.

For example, the accord is attempting to address the gap that occurred between COVID-19 vaccines in rich and poorer countries, which WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said amounted to "a catastrophic moral failure."

The draft says WHO should get 20% of the production of pandemic-related products like tests, treatments and vaccines and urges countries to disclose their deals with private companies.

"There's no mechanism within WHO to make life really difficult for any countries that decide not to act in accordance with the treaty," Davies said.

Adam Kamradt-Scott, a global health expert at Harvard University, said that similar to the global climate agreements, the draft pandemic treaty would at least provide a new forum for countries to try to hold each other to account, where governments will have to explain what measures they've taken.

The pandemic treaty "is not about anyone telling the government of a country what it can do and what it cannot do," said Roland Driece, co-chair of WHO's negotiating board for the agreement.

There are legally binding obligations under the International Health Regulations, including quickly reporting dangerous new outbreaks. But those have been flouted repeatedly, including by African countries during Ebola outbreaks and China in the early stages of COVID-19.

READ MORE: States trash masks and pandemic gear as huge stockpiles linger and expire

Suerie Moon, co-director of the Global Health Center at Geneva's Graduate Institute, said it was critical to determine the expected role of WHO during a pandemic and how outbreaks might be stopped before spreading globally.

"If we fail to seize this window of opportunity which is closing we'll be just as vulnerable as we were in 2019," she warned.

Some countries appear to be moving on their own to ensure cooperation from others in the next pandemic. Last month, President Joe Biden's administration said it would help 50 countries respond to new outbreaks and prevent global spread, giving the country leverage should it need critical information or materials in the future.

Yuanqiong Hu, a senior legal and policy adviser at Doctors without Borders, said it's unclear what might be different in the next pandemic, but hoped that focusing attention on some of the glaring errors that emerged in COVID-19 might help.

"We will mostly have to rely on countries to do better," she said. "That is worrisome."

Cheng reported from London.

Left: FILE PHOTO: Nurse practitioner Sarah Gonzalez prepares to give a dose of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) Moderna vaccine at a mass vaccination site at Brooklyn Army Terminal in New York City, New York, January 10, 2021. File photo by Andrew Kelly/Reuters

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Leaders worldwide struggle to draft pandemic treaty to avoid COVID mistakes in the future - PBS NewsHour

CLEVELAND, Ohio The number of new COVID-19 cases in Ohio has fallen below the 1,000 mark for the first time since the early days of the pandemic in March 2020.

New cases dropped from 1,241 last week to 936 this week, marking the 12th consecutive week of falling case numbers, the state reported Thursday.

The last time the reported cases were under 1,000 for a week was in late March 2020, soon after the first cases of the coronavirus were reported in Ohio. By later that year, there were more than 50,000 cases a week.

As recently as early January, the weekly case numbers were over 15,000, at 15,046.

At least 1,349,241 Ohioans have received the updated one-dose COVID-19 vaccine, an increase of 2,419 people from the prior week, the state reported. This represents 11.5% of the states population.

The total COVID-19 case count since early 2020 in Ohio has reached 3,746,211.

There were 51 Ohioans newly hospitalized in the last week, raising the total since the beginning of the pandemic in 2020 to 151,443. Two people were admitted into the ICU, bringing the total since 2020 to 15,805.

The state health department reported an additional nine deaths from COVID-19, raising the total to 43,947. Death reporting sometimes lags by weeks.

May 9 recap

* Total reported cases: 3,746,211, up 936.

* Total individuals with updated vaccine: 1,349,241, up 2,419.

* Total reported deaths: 43,947, up 9.

* Total reported hospitalizations: 151,443, up 51.

* Total reported ICU admissions: 15,805, up 2.

May 2 recap

Total reported cases: 3,745,275, up 1,241.

Total individuals with updated vaccine: 1,346,822, up 2,985.

Total reported deaths: 43,938, up 12.

Total reported hospitalizations: 151,392, up 61.

Total reported ICU admissions: 15,803, up 1.

Julie Washington covers healthcare for cleveland.com. Read previous stories at this link.

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Weekly COVID-19 cases fall below 1,000 for first time since March 2020: Coronavirus update for Thursday, May 9 - cleveland.com

QuidelOrtho, a local diagnostic company that makes at-home COVID-19 test kits, has a new CEO and announced Wednesday that it will cut at least 5 percent of its workforce to save money.

The San Diego-based biotech has struggled to find its financial footing after demand for its COVID-19 test kits deflated and the economy stagnated following a pandemic boom.

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Brian J. Blaser, a former executive at pharmaceutical giant Abbott, was introduced this week as QuidelOrthos new president and chief executive. He replaces former CEO Douglas Bryant, who was terminated in February after leading the company for nearly 15 years.

Blaser has more than two decades of experience in the in-vitro diagnostics sector, most recently as the executive vice president of Diagnostic Products of Abbott Laboratories. Prior to Abbott, he also led the clinical diagnostics division at Johnson & Johnson and worked at Eastman Kodak and General Motors.

San Diego-based QuidelOrtho appointed Brian J. Blaser as its new president and CEO.

(Courtesy of QuidelOrtho)

He will receive a base salary of $1 million, equity awards and an annual target cash bonus of $1.25 million to $1.5 million, according to the companys filing with the SEC. The company also granted Blaser a signing bonus of $3 million of stock awards that are subject to vesting terms. He will also be given a travel and housing allowance through December.

Three days into the job, Blaser joined QuidelOrtho executives on a first-quarter earnings call with investors Wednesday. He expressed his commitment to the business and shared why he wanted to join QuidelOrtho at this crucial moment.

QuidelOrtho touches every stage of the patient care spectrum, including prevention, diagnosis, patient care and monitoring, Blaser said during the call. This business has all of the underlying capabilities required to drive exceptional growth and profitability in a large and expanding market. There is work to do and I am excited about steering the company so it can achieve its full potential.

In the short term, Blaser said his focus is on customer satisfaction and patient care, improving profitability and cash flow, while reducing our debt level, and positioning ourselves to compete effectively in the highly competitive diagnostics market.

Blaser and QuidelOrthos leadership team reassured investors throughout the call that they are committed to making necessary cost cutting measures to strengthen the business.

The company said it will reduce its headcount by 5 to 6 percent, or approximately 500 people, for a savings of $100 million annually. QuidelOrtho had 7,100 employees worldwide, with 4,200 workers based in the United States as of Dec. 31.

Joseph Busky, chief financial officer of QuidelOrtho, said the layoffs should be completed by mid-year. He said most of these positions were higher level management roles, which comprised roughly 10 to 12 percent of the organizations total payroll.

QuidelOrtho reported a net loss of $1.7 billion during the first quarter compared with a profit of $48.8 million in the same period a year ago. Revenue for the quarter was $711 million, down 16 percent from a year ago. The company attributed the decline primarily to a drop in orders for COVID-19 test kits.

In May 2020, QuidelOrtho received the first emergency use authorization from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for its at-home COVID-19 antigen test. The companys revenue initially jumped but then later slowed as the pandemic ended and demand for tests fell.

Respiratory revenue, which includes COVID-19-related products, accounted for 19 percent of the companys total revenue this quarter. Last year during the same period, it accounted for about one-third of QuidelOrthos total revenue.

COVID-19-related government orders also dropped with QuidelOrtho receiving $7 million for the quarter versus $143 million a year ago.

QuidelOrtho said it expects its respiratory and COVID-19-related revenue to stay at or below its previous projections for the year. However, the company did not provide investors with an overall financial guidance for the year, citing the transition to its new CEO.

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After fall in demand for COVID-19 tests, San Diego's QuidelOrtho to lay off 500 workers - The San Diego Union-Tribune

Amid withdrawal of AstraZeneca's Covishield and doctors calling for review of science behind Covid vaccines, two new variants of Omicron lineage collectively known as FLiRT are spreading in US. It has sparked concern of a fresh wave. This has left everyone worried and curious about the variants KP.2 and KP.11 that have undergone new mutations and have become more infectious than previous variants. They can evade immunity from vaccines and previous infections. The symptoms largely remain the same like fever, cough, fatigue, digestive trouble etc. In the wake of waning immunity and social distancing no longer a norm, it's important to stay alert against the new Covid threat. (Also read: New Covid variant FLiRT spreads in US; do we need to worry? Symptoms to precaution, all you need to know)

"In the landscape of Covid-19, Covid-19 variants within the Omicron JN.1 lineage, called FLiRt variants, present new challenges. The variants KP.2 and KP 1.1 have new mutations that make them more contagious than previous Omicron variants. Their symptoms, akin to earlier variants, include fever, cough, and fatigue. However, their heightened transmission rate demands stringent precautions. They also show the ability to evade immunity from prior infection and vaccines. The variant spreads easily through respiratory droplets, posing risks to all, especially the unvaccinated and those with compromised immunity. With subtle genetic differences, FLiRt diverges from earlier variants, requiring tailored management techniques," says Dr. Sushila Kataria, Senior Director, Internal Medicine, Medanta, Gurugram.

Dr Arunesh Kumar, Sr Consultant & Head - Respiratory Medicine, Paras Health, Gurugram shares key facts about the FLiRT variant:

According to The Infectious Disease Society of America, this new COVID variant is a subvariant of the Omicron variant, named FLiRT. They are called FLiRT because of the changes in their genetic mutations at positions 456 and 346. These variants are spreading rapidly across states in the US and I it is believed that they may be able to evade the immune system.

FLiRT is composed of two significant variants, namely KP.2 and KP.1.1, which are sub-variants of Pirola and JN.1 of the Omicron lineage. The former variant is spreading at a rapid pace, while the latter is expected to contribute to about 7.5% of new Covid-19 cases in the US.

The symptoms of FLiRT mainly affect the upper respiratory tract and include a sore throat, nasal congestion, runny nose, cough, fever, headache, and loss of taste and smell. Hospitalization rates for patients with these symptoms are not higher than usual. However, this variant is highly infectious, as it can easily spread from an infected person to a healthy individual due to new mutations in the virus.

This variant is spread by the person's respiratory droplets to others, by touching infected surfaces like kitchen countertops, furniture, faucets, elevator buttons, or by being in close proximity to the sick person. The emphasis now is on more comprehensive steps to slow the transmission of common respiratory viruses as COVID-19, RSV, and influenza.

This variation is easily transmitted by respiratory droplets, which puts everyone at riskbut particularly the unvaccinated and those with weakened immune systems. FLiRT variant differs from previous versions because of minor genetic alterations. In order to stop transmission, we must be watchful and make sure that improved testing, targeted vaccines, and ongoing adherence to preventive measures are fulfilled. People with specific age groups, such as youngsters and the elderly, people with comorbid diseases should pay additional care and follow Covid-friendly practices.

"However, its a small surge, and there is no need to panic. We should stay vigilant and ensure enhanced testing, targeted vaccinations, and continued adherence to preventive measures are necessary to prevent transmission. By staying informed, vigilant, and united, we navigate this new variant with resilience, prioritizing collective health and well-being. We should adhere to COVID-friendly protocols, i.e., washing hands properly, wearing masks; people of certain age groups such as children and the elderly should pay extra attention, as should people with comorbid conditions," says Dr Kataria.

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How dangerous is FLiRT? 5 things to know about new Covid-19 variant spreading in US - Hindustan Times

Covid-19 may have gone away but controversies over vaccine side-effects refuse to die. Covishield, the Covid-19 vaccine developed by UK-based drug major AstraZeneca and Oxford University and produced in India by Serum Institute of India, has triggered a big controversy in India with political parties too jumping in. There are demands for compensation for family members of people who died allegedly due to the vaccine side effects and to review the science behind all Covid vaccines.

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It all started with a submission made by Astrazeneva in a British court. It said in court documents that its Covid vaccine can cause a rare side effect, the UKs Daily Telegraph newspaper reported nearly 10 days ago. The pharmaceutical giant is being sued for over 100 million (a little over Rs 1,000 crore) in class action over claims its vaccine caused death and serious injury in 51 cases, according to court documents seen by the Daily Telegraph, a British newspaper.

AstraZeneca is contesting the claims but has accepted, in a legal document submitted to the high court in February, that its Covid vaccine can, in very rare cases, cause thrombosis with thrombocytopenia syndrome, which causes people to have blood clots and a low blood platelet count.

The India angle

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Venugopalan Govindan, father of Karunya, who died after taking the vaccine, said the admission by AstraZeneca is "too late" and has come after so many lives have been lost. " The parents have already filed a writ petition seeking compensation, appointment of an expert medical board independent of the government to forthwith inquire into and investigate the deaths of their daughter, and to share the report of the investigation with them.

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A plea has been filed in the Supreme Court, seeking setting up of an expert medical panel to study and assess the possible risk factors associated with the vaccine. It calls for a direction to the Centre to implement a vaccine damage payment system to compensate citizens who are severely disabled or deceased as a result of the vaccine.

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What is the chief concern?

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TTS is a rare yet serious condition linked to certain COVID-19 vaccines, notably adenovirus vector vaccines like AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson's Janssen vaccine. TTS is marked by the presence of blood clots (thrombosis) along with low levels of platelets (thrombocytopenia), crucial for blood clotting. It often involves unusual clot locations, such as in the brain (cerebral venous sinus thrombosis) or abdomen. Symptoms may include severe or persistent headaches, blurred vision, shortness of breath, chest pain, leg swelling, persistent abdominal pain, and easy bruising or tiny blood spots under the skin beyond the injection site.

While TTS is rare, individuals who have received vaccines associated with TTS should be vigilant for symptoms and seek medical attention promptly if they experience any within a few weeks of vaccination. Early recognition and treatment are essential for managing TTS effectively.

What AstraZeneca and SII say

"Our sympathy goes out to anyone who has lost loved ones or reported health problems," AstraZeneca has said amid concerns over the side-effects. "Patient safety is our highest priority, and regulatory authorities have clear and stringent standards to ensure the safe use of all medicines, including vaccines."

The product information relating to the AstraZeneca vaccine was updated in April 2021, with the approval of the UK regulator MHRA, to include the possibility that the vaccine is capable, in very rare cases, of being a trigger for TTS. AstraZeneca points out this update was well documented and publicly available, The Telegraph reported. The vaccine, developed with Oxford University, is no longer used in the UK.

Benefits of the vaccine far outweigh the risks of extremely rare potential side effects, AstraZeneca has told news agency IANS. "From the body of evidence in clinical trials and real-world data, the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine has continuously been shown to have an acceptable safety profile," the statement said. "Regulators around the world consistently state that the benefits of vaccination outweigh the risks of extremely rare potential side effects," it added.

AstraZeneca has begun the global withdrawal of its COVID-19 vaccine, Vaxzevria, citing a surplus of available updated vaccines since the pandemic began. The company has also decided to withdraw the vaccine's marketing authorizations within Europe. "As multiple, variant COVID-19 vaccines have since been developed, there is a surplus of available updated vaccines," AstraZeneca stated. This surplus has led to a decline in demand for Vaxzevria, which is no longer being manufactured or supplied."

SSI, the Indian manufacturer of AstraZeneca's vaccine under brand name Covishield, said on Wednesday that it had stopped manufacturing the vaccine and supply of additional doses in December 2021 itself. "With India achieving high vaccination rates in 2021 and 2022, coupled with the emergence of new mutant variant strains, the demand for previous vaccines diminished significantly, an SII spokesperson said. "Consequently, since December 2021, we have stopped the manufacturing and supply of additional doses of Covishield".

Moreover, SII also said that it had disclosed all rare and very rare side effects of the vaccine, including TTS, in the packaging inserts as well. "Regardless of whether it's AstraZeneca's Vaxzervria or our own Covishield, both vaccines have been instrumental in saving millions of lives worldwide. We commend the collaborative efforts of governments and ministries in facilitating a unified global response to the pandemic."

What experts say

"In spite of the uncommon risk of TTS, Covishield, which was used to vaccinate 90% of India's population, has done well in India," a senior member of the Covid working group told ET, downplaying worries of unfavorable outcomes.

Dr Kameshwar Prasad, emeritus professor of neurology at AIIMS, has told TOI that TTS is rare, but if it happens, it is usually serious, particularly when major vessels are involved in thrombosis. "We were members of a committee which developed a WHO guideline where the frequency of this condition has been estimated as less than 1 to 7 per lakh vaccines. Estimates of the risk of TTS following Covishield vaccination range from 1 case per 26,500 after the first doses of Covishield administered (reported in Norway) to 1 case per 261,000 doses of Janssen [vaccine] administered (reported in the US)," he said.

Dr Prasad said that TTS mostly occurs from day 3 to day 30 after the first dose of vaccine. "Beyond 30 days, there are very very few cases reported. If the first dose did not have this complication, its very unlikely that the second dose would cause TTS. In any case, after one month of vaccination, there is a negligible chance that TTS will develop, certainly after three months. Now that more than a year has passed since the last vaccine dose of Covid for most people from India, there is no need to worry about TTS," he said. He advised people not to hesitate to take vaccines rolled out by the government. "It is done after it is certain that the benefits outweigh the risks. Risks may not be more than moving on a road," he said.

The WHO has said that the recent epidemiological data suggests that the cumulative incidence of TTS is higher following the initial dose of the COVID-19 vaccine than subsequent doses.

Former Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) scientist R Ganga Ketkar, who was at the helm of affairs during the Covid pandemic, said symptoms of TTS - a serious adverse event that causes blood clots - can only occur within five to 30 days of receiving a Covid vaccine and not now. "The benefits of the vaccine outweigh the risks," Ketkar has told ET. "People should not worry as the number of cases are pretty small and TTS develops within 5-30 days after receiving the vaccine and not now." He said as the number of doses increases, the risk of TTS goes down.

A study conducted by physician-scientists from Assam Medical College Hospital (Dibrugarh), supported by ICMR-recognised multidisciplinary research laboratory, has revealed that 55% of Covishield vaccine recipients experienced only minor side effects like fever and headache. These symptoms occurred within a week of getting inoculated with the first dose. Researchers confirmed no long-term adverse effects after a year. In our study, we found that 55% experienced minor adverse events such as fever, headache, body ache and pain at the injection site. The remaining 45% of the recipients had no adverse events at all. After the second dose, only 6.8% showed minor adverse events following immunisation (AEFI). Most importantly, no participant showed any major adverse events during the entire one year period of study, associate professor of pathology at AMCH, Gayatri Gogoi, the principal investigator of the study done in Assams Dibrugarh district, has told TOI.

The study was conducted from July 2021 when the first Covishield vaccine for the public was introduced and participants were followed up till June 2022 after receiving the approval of the Institutional Ethics Committee to conduct the same. This data of research findings was recently accepted for publication in a well-known PubMed indexed journal named Journal of Family Medicine and Primary Care.

Besides experts, the government too has downplayed the frequency of the risks associated with the vaccine. Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya said in March that ICMR has done a detailed study which shows that COVID-19 vaccine is not responsible for heart attacks, and an individual's lifestyle and factors such as binge drinking could be among underlying causes. "If someone has a stroke today, they think it is because of the Covid vaccine. ICMR has done a detailed study that the (Covid) vaccine is not responsible for heart attacks."

Amid the controversy over the side effects of the AstraZeneca vaccine, Bharat Biotech has asserted that its Covid-19 vaccine, Covaxin, is safe and devoid of any side-effects The company stated that Covaxin was developed with a single-minded focus on safety first, followed by efficacy. Covaxin is India's first indigenous Covid vaccine.

India's vaccine politics Political parties have questioned the government about the health concerns related to the vaccine. "The opposition Congress on Wednesday alleged that the BJP government at the centre did not follow the guidelines of the World Health Organisation (WHO), and demanded that the relatives of those who died due to heart attack or similar reasons after taking the Covishield vaccine against coronavirus should be paid compensation. Doctors associated with the Gujarat BJP, however, said a study by an expert panel in the state had established that there was no direct link between COVID-19 vaccines and blood clotting which can lead to heart attacks," PTI reported.

Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav Friday said the lives of the people of the country have been put in danger by the Covid vaccine and demanded that the heart-related tests like ECG should be made free for those who have taken the vaccine.

Months before the AstraZeneca controversy, Union minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar hit out at senior Congress functionaries, claiming that they kept pushing the case for foreign vaccines in India during the pandemic. His statement came days after Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla faced questions over the efficacy of the companys vaccines.

The minister claimed that Pfizer tried to bully India into accepting conditions of indemnity. Just to remind all Indians that Pfizer tried to bully the Govt of India into accepting conditions of indemnity. And Cong trio of Rahul, Chidambaram n Jairam Ramesh kept pushing foreign vaccines during Covid, he tweeted. According to the indemnity clause, the company could not be held responsible or prosecuted under Indian law in case of any severe side-effect or even death on taking their vaccine.

The Pfizer vaccine is not available in the country. India ran its massive vaccination campaign against Covid-19 with two key vaccines Covishield and Covaxin. Covishield is manufactured by the Serum Institute of India while Covaxin is manufactured by Bharat Biotech.

(With inputs from TOI and PTI)

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Good shot, bad shot: What you need to know about Covishield issue - The Economic Times

For most of this year, the JN.1 variant of the coronavirus accounted for an overwhelming majority of Covid cases. But now, an offshoot variant called KP.2 is taking off. The variant, which made up just one percent of cases in the United States in mid-March, now makes up over a quarter.

KP.2 belongs to a subset of Covid variants that scientists have cheekily nicknamed FLiRT, drawn from the letters in the names of their mutations. They are descendants of JN.1, and KP.2 is very, very close to JN.1, said Dr. David Ho, a virologist at Columbia University. But Dr. Ho has conducted early lab tests in cells that suggest that slight differences in KP.2s spike protein might make it better at evading our immune defenses and slightly more infectious than JN.1.

While cases currently dont appear to be on the rise, researchers and physicians are closely watching whether the variant will drive a summer surge.

I dont think anybodys expecting things to change abruptly, necessarily, said Dr. Marc Sala, co-director of the Northwestern Medicine Comprehensive Covid-19 Center in Chicago. But KP.2 will most likely be our new norm, he said. Heres what to know.

Experts said it would take several weeks to see whether KP.2 might lead to a rise in Covid cases, and noted that we have only a limited understanding of how the virus is spreading. Since the public health emergency ended, there is less robust data available on cases, and doctors said fewer people were using Covid tests.

But what we do know is reassuring: Despite the shift in variants, data from the C.D.C. suggests there are only minimal levels of the virus circulating in wastewater nationally, and emergency department visits and hospitalizations fell between early March and late April.

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What to Know About New Covid Variants, FLiRT: Symptoms, Vaccines and More - The New York Times