Category: Covid-19

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FILE - Medical staff prepares an AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine during preparations at the vaccine center in Ebersberg near Munich, Germany, Monday, March 22, 2021. The pharma giant AstraZeneca has requested that its European authorization for its COVID vaccine be pulled, according to the EU medicines regulator on Wednesday, May 8, 2024. (AP Photo/Matthias Schrader, FILE)

LONDON (AP) The pharma giant AstraZeneca has requested that the European authorization for its COVID-19 vaccine be pulled, according to the EU medicines regulator.

In an update on the European Medicines Agencys website Wednesday, the regulator said that the approval for AstraZenecas Vaxzevria had been withdrawn at the request of the marketing authorization holder.

AstraZenecas COVID-19 vaccine was first given the nod by the EMA in January 2021. Within weeks, however, concerns grew about the vaccines safety, when dozens of countries suspended the vaccines use after unusual but rare blood clots were detected in a small number of immunized people. The EU regulator concluded AstraZenecas shot didnt raise the overall risk of clots, but doubts remained.

Partial results from its first major trial which Britain used to authorize the vaccine were clouded by a manufacturing mistake that researchers didnt immediately acknowledge. Insufficient data about how well the vaccine protected older people led some countries to initially restrict its use to younger populations before reversing course.

Billions of doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine were distributed to poorer countries through a U.N.-coordinated program, as it was cheaper and easier to produce and distribute. But studies later suggested that the pricier messenger RNA vaccines made by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna provided better protection against COVID-19 and its many variants, and most countries switched to those shots.

The U.K.s national coronavirus immunization program in 2021 heavily relied on AstraZenecas vaccine, which was largely developed by scientists at Oxford University with significant financial government support. But even Britain later resorted to buying the mRNA vaccines for its COVID booster vaccination programs and the AstraZeneca vaccine is now rarely used globally.

___

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institutes Science and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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AstraZeneca pulls its COVID-19 vaccine from the European market - NBC4 WCMH-TV

AstraZeneca

Pharmaceutical company says newer shots led to decline in demand for AstraZeneca vaccine, which is no longer being manufactured or supplied

AstraZeneca has begun the worldwide withdrawal of its Covid-19 vaccine due to a surplus of available updated vaccines that target new variants of the virus.

The announcement follows the pharmaceutical company in March voluntarily withdrawing its European Union marketing authorisation, which is the approval to market a medicine in member states.

On 7 May, the European Medicines Agency issued a notice that the vaccine is no longer authorised for use.

In a statement, AstraZeneca said the decision was made because there is now a variety of newer vaccines available that have been adapted to target Covid-19 variants. This had led to a decline in demand for the AstraZeneca vaccine, which is no longer being manufactured or supplied.

According to independent estimates, over 6.5 million lives were saved in the first year of use alone and over 3bn doses were supplied globally, the statement said.

Our efforts have been recognised by governments around the world and are widely regarded as being a critical component of ending the global pandemic. We will now work with regulators and our partners to align on a clear path forward to conclude this chapter and significant contribution to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Other countries have already stopped supplying the vaccine. It has not been available for use in Australia since March 2023, though its use was already being phased out from June 2021 due to the widespread availability of newer vaccines.

AstraZeneca changed the name of its Covid vaccine to Vaxzevria in 2021. The vaccine was authorised for use in those aged 18 and older, delivered as two injections, usually into the muscle of the upper arm, about three month apart. It was also used by some countries as a booster shot.

Vaxzevria is made up of another virus of the adenovirus family modified to contain the gene for making a protein from SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19. The vaccine does not contain the virus itself and cannot cause the virus.

Although the vaccine was found to be safe and effective overall, it carried the risk of a rare but serious side-effect, known as thrombosis with thrombocytopenia, or TTS. The rare syndrome occurred in about two to three people per 100,000 who were vaccinated with the Vaxzevria vaccine.

The chair of epidemiology at Deakin University in Australia, Prof Catherine Bennett, said the vaccine had played a pivotal part in the worldwide fight against the virus, particularly in the early days of the pandemic when limited vaccines were available.

It has saved millions of lives and that should not be forgotten, she said.

It was a really important part of the initial global response. However, it targeted the initial ancestral variants. Weve now moved into a vaccine chain where we have products available that are chasing the variants that are emerging.

Theres also a shift in the risk calculus as well, given populations are much more protected and, even though of course Covid still causes deaths, we are overall less vulnerable to the disease.

The latest Covid-19 vaccine advice issued by the World Health Organisation in April advised that formulations of Covid-19 vaccines should target the JN.1 lineage of the virus, which is displacing existing XBB lineage variants.

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A major clinical trial has found that an additional COVID 19 vaccine dose led to the majority of clinically extremely vulnerable people mounting defensive antibodies against Covid-19.

New research published inThe Lancet Rheumatologyfrom the OCTAVE DUO research trial co-led by the University of Birmingham and University of Glasgow found that vaccine boosters led to improved antibody responses among many groups of immunocompromised and immunosuppressed patients.

Co-funded by the Government and Blood Cancer UK and supported by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR), this trial opened in 11 hospitals across the UK and recruited 804 patients across nine disease areas, all of whom had previously mounted low or no immune response from an initial two doses of the vaccines.

Among those who mounted a low immune response, 90% patients who received a third vaccine dose went onto develop significant antibody levels.

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However, more than half (54%) of non-respondents from the initial vaccine course still saw no relevant antibody increase. Furthermore, the study found that those with lymphoid disease and chronic renal disease had the worst antibody mounting outcomes from boosters.

The OCTAVE DUO study also found:

Pamela Kearns, Professor of Clinical Paediatric Oncology and Director of the Institute of Cancer and Genomic Sciences at the University of Birmingham, and a lead investigator of the trial said:

The Covid booster programme has been shown to have an important protective effect for many of the most clinically vulnerable members of society for whom the initial two doses were insufficient. In the OCTAVE DUO study, we tracked those who mounted little or no antibody defences following two initial doses of a vaccine. It is encouraging to see that boosters helped to increase antibody defences 9 in 10 participants who hadnt previously mounted a defence after two jabs.

However, more than half of those who didnt respond at all to an initial course of vaccines didnt develop any antibody defence after boosters. This underscores the need for other protective factors to support the most clinically vulnerable in society and continue to be vigilant against Covid in society.

Professor Iain McInnes, Head of the College of Medical, Veterinary and Life Sciences at the University of Glasgow and Chief Investigator for the OCTAVE Consortium, said:

Our first OCTAVE study revealed a group of patients who may not mount a sufficient immune response following a vaccine dose, which is why the OCTAVE DUO study is so important. For the clinically vulnerable in our society, the vaccine booster programme offers important protection, therefore further understanding of the effectiveness of vaccines in people with immune-mediated inflammatory diseases is extremely important.

"It is encouraging to see the results of OCTAVE DUO, which provides important answers and reinforces the need to support and protect patients who are more clinically vulnerable.

Reference:Goodyear CS, Patel A, Barnes E, et al. Immunogenicity of third dose COVID-19 vaccine strategies in patients who are immunocompromised with suboptimal immunity following two doses (OCTAVE-DUO): an open-label, multicentre, randomised, controlled, phase 3 trial. Lancet Rheumatol. 2024. doi: 10.1016/S2665-9913(24)00065-1

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Third COVID-19 Vaccine Booster Improves Antibody Responses for Vulnerable Patients - Technology Networks

The COVID-19 pandemic significantly increased interest in wearable health-monitoring devices among low-income Hispanic and Latine adults living in the U.S., a new Northwestern University study has found.

While the pandemic highlighted the need for regular health monitoring, these groups often lack access to affordable health care and sometimes distrust existing health systems. Wearables, therefore, could provide a reliable, at-home alternative to traditional in-clinic health monitoring.

But, although interest has increased, several barriers remain that prevent these groups from adopting wearable technologies. According to the researchers, tech companies historically have designed current wearable devices with affluent, predominantly white users in mind.

Current designers do not consider the needs of low-income people of color regarding usability, accessibility and affordability, said Northwesterns Stefany Cruz, who led the study. If this trend continues, it will worsen digital and health inequities. In this study, we want to bring attention to existing health disparities and how wearable devices expand that gap. Wearables have the potential to fill the gap eventually, but were not there yet. We need to build devices that are more inclusive, and the design process should consider the context and culture of individuals from marginalized communities.

The study was published today (May 8) in the Journal of Medical Internet Research.

Cruz is a Ph.D. candidate in computer engineering at Northwesterns McCormick School of Engineering. In her engineering work, Cruz is particularly interested in building equitable, efficient and intelligent wearable systems for groups historically excluded from the design process.

Cruzs own experiences as a child of Salvadoran immigrants inspired her to embark on this new study. Growing up in East Los Angeles, Cruz was often sick, and her family did not have health insurance. After suffering a bout of strep throat, she watched her family struggle to pay the medical bills an experience that sparked her interest in developing new technologies with a focus on health.

That set up the whole trajectory of what I want to pursue in the computer engineering field, Cruz said. Because I witnessed the severe lack of access to health care, I want to build technologies from the ground up that can help support and uplift my community.

Although Cruz planned the study before pandemic hit, she noticed that COVID-19 changed the role of wearables in society. Once used mostly for counting steps and motivating people to move through the day, wearable devices now began playing a bigger role in health monitoring. These devices could track vital physiological signals, including blood oxygen levels. Low blood oxygen levels often have no symptoms until organs are irreparably damaged. But wearables could detect early warning signs, prompting a person to head to the hospital sooner before its too late.

It was easy for Cruz to see how this technology could help her community. But why werent people taking advantage of these devices?

To understand perceptions of wearables and identify the barriers to adoption, Cruz assembled a small group of low-income Hispanic and Latine adults in Chicago and Los Angeles. Participants met the low-income criteria if their income levels fell at or below the low-income threshold according to their countys Department of Housing and Community Development.

After establishing a focus group, Cruz held two rounds of in-depth interviews between December 2021 and March 2022. In the first interviews, Cruz noticed that multiple participants made connections between COVID-19 and wearable devices. So, then she conducted a second round of interviews with more emphasis on using wearables for health monitoring. In these conversations, Cruz explored the participants opinions regarding wearable technology for health, their communitys perception of wearables and the features they would like to see in future wearables. She also asked participants about their access to Wi-Fi and other resource constraints.

Throughout the interviews, Cruz consistently found that the COVID-19 pandemic strongly influenced perceptions of wearable electronics. Participants who felt apathetic before the pandemic expressed a significantly increased interest in wearables for personal health monitoring and management.

About two-thirds of the participants in the study lost a close family member to COVID-19. Several of the participants also contracted COVID-19 before the vaccine and other treatments became available. These experiences made them realize how useful wearable health-monitoring tools can be.

I guess the one thing that scares me that I never even thought of until I got COVID were my oxygen levels, one participant said. Like, am I at normal levels? Is that an issue that I need to kind of think about?

One thing I noticed, especially with COVID right now which isthe timing of getting all your vitals measured can actually save somebody's life, another participant said. So, I think that's a very important thing. Like oxygen levels to be measured.

Participants also discussed difficulties when trying to access health care and how wearables could potentially compensate for the lack of local resources. Specifically, some participants shared how their neighborhood hospitals had closed, forcing community members to seek care at small, overcrowded clinics.

It's overly populated. Even if you make an appointment, you're there all day, one Los Angeles-based participant said. Whatever time you go, whatever day you go, it's always crowded, because it's one of the very few [clinics] that accepts Medi-Cal. So low-income communities, they don't have the resources; it's always crowded.

One participant highlighted that community members' lack of trust in doctors, coupled with high medical expenses, posed barriers to seeking medical treatment.

Hispanic people don't go to the doctor because they don't believe in the doctor, the participant said. They think the doctors are gonna kill them and then they're poor, so they can't pay for the doctor. So, like if [a wearable] could do basic [vital] tests that would be great.

As a part of the interview process, Cruz asked participants what features and functions they desired in wearable devices. Cruz noted that oftentimes technologies designed for low-income groups do not take the intended users needs into account.

If we are the ones that are supposed to wear the devices, then it makes sense to ask our opinions of how they can be incorporated into our daily lives, she said.

In addition to wanting health monitoring capabilities (for heart rate, oxygen levels, blood pressure and more), the participants also desired enhanced affordability, control over the captured health data and increased durability. For wearables to be most effective, users must wear them continuously to capture consistent health data. This is where durability becomes a critical factor.

I do think that it has to be very durable because the purpose is [for] low-income communities, one participant said. They don't have money to replace it. We just don't have comfy jobs. A lot of us work more physically demanding jobs. Some of us are plumbers, some are construction workers, some of us are gardeners. Some of us run a business and like that business involves pots and pans like we're restaurant workers. If [the device] breaks, they're just gonna say oops and throw it awayIf it is more durable thats one of the biggest keys to wearing it.

Although many people have moved on from the pandemic and resumed normal lives, Cruz said her community is still reeling. Cruz lost several family members to COVID-19 and hopes that designing more inclusive technologies can prevent future suffering.

During COVID-19, my community suffered a lot, Cruz said. Some people have been able to brush it off and move on, but some of us are still scarred. We lost family members that probably would still be alive if they werent infected. Many people have long-COVID symptoms, which wearables also could help monitor. As these technologies get better at sensing vital signals, they also should become more inclusive.

The title of the paper is Perceptions of wearable health tools post-COVID-19 in low-income Latine communities. Northwestern co-authors include Maia Jacobs, who is the Lisa Wissner-Slivka and Benjamin Slivka Professor of Computer Science at McCormick, and students Claire Lu and Mara Ulloa. Cruz is advised by study co-author Josiah Hester, who was an assistant professor computer engineering at Northwestern when the research launched. Now, Hester is an associate professor of interactive computing and computer science at Georgia Tech.

See the original post:

COVID-19 pandemic changed attitudes toward wearables - Northwestern Now - Northwestern Now

Story Links By Kirk San Roman

It all happened so fast. In March, 2020 I was blissfully serving as an Assistant Director, Athletics Communications at Cal State Fullerton. After a long career in sales, and distribution management, I had been offered a dream opportunity to use my writing skills for my alma mater, and favorite sports programs. At nearly 60-years-old, I hoped to spend my remaining working years in the position. With Hall of Fame Sports Information Director, Mel Franks, retired for several years, it was planned for me to become the archivist of Titan Athletics history.

I was soon given the day-to-day responsibility for reporting on women's basketball, women's tennis, and men's golf. Happily, these were all sports that I genuinely enjoyed. Additionally, over my many years as a booster, I already enjoyed a personal relationship with most of the Titan coaches throughout the department.

Although I was probably older than some of their fathers, my colleagues in the Sports Information Department were all genial and good-humored, although our tastes in music surely differed. Things were going well until

On Tuesday, March 10, things began to happen. The Titans had the previous day completed a home women's tennis match with the University of Memphis.At that time, we four SID's would write a website preview of the next game, match, or series for our respective sports. As I was scanning the Abilene Christian University website for details about their tennis squad for my story, I noticed that they had removed the match at Fullerton from their online schedule.

Curious about the unannounced change, I sought out then-Titan women's tennis head coach, Dianne Matias, to find out what she knew. Not in her office, I walked out to the tennis courts where the team was practicing.Coach Matias was in a huddle with Steve DiTolla, who was Senior Associate Athletics Director.

After I waited for their conversation to wrap-up, I queried coach Matias. She explained to me that Abilene Christian was not coming out due to COVID-19 concerns. While we had all very recently heard about this contagious disease in the news, I couldn't believe that an entire sports team would refuse to travel as a result of some very new, and incomplete information.

Fullerton's tennis team was 7-5 at the time, with a talented lineup, and had just begun to play conference matches. Coach Matias was understandably anxious to fill the hole in her schedule. Westmont College, near Santa Barbara, quickly agreed to host the Titans. The match was set for Friday, March 13th. It would never be played.

Later that Tuesday evening, as the Big West Women's Basketball Tournament was about to open at Long Beach State's Walter Pyramid, it was suddenly announced that although the scheduled contests would be played, no spectators would be allowed inside the arena. My thoughts went immediately to those fans who had spent their time and money to travel from as far away as Hawaii and Northern California in order to attend the games.

The Titan women were coming off of their best season in decades, and Raina Perez had just been named Big West Player of the Year. Titan head coach, Jeff Harada, was justifiably excited about his tournament prospects.

It was eerie walking around the cavernous, empty arena, looking at 4,000 unfilled seats.As SID for the sport, I was one of the very few allowed into the building. Athletic Director, Jim Donovan, was among the few familiar Fullerton faces, and we spoke about the odd experience.

The bouncing basketballs and yelling coaches had never seemed louder to me as I sat courtside. The Titans comfortably advanced after a 15-point victory over CSUN, and would compete again the next day, Wednesday, March 11.

Playing once more in an empty arena, the Titans had an 8:30 p.m. tip-off against Hawaii.Our ladies put up a valiant fight, but Fullerton ultimately fell to the Rainbow Wahine squad. I remember sitting in the press room, typing up my recap story and linking in the box score on my laptop until almost midnight before driving home from the Pyramid.

While I was disappointed that the Titan women were eliminated, I was excited that the Men's Tournament would be opening the following afternoon, Thursday, March 12, at the 18,336-seat Honda Center in Anaheim. While the no spectators' rule would also be in effect for the men's tournament, I had secured an all-access pass that would allow me to roam freely while my beloved Titans opened against CSUN. The pass would also allow me to attend all of the other games that would be played over the three-day tournament. Before I could get in my car that morning to make the 10-minute drive to the Honda Center, I received word that the Big West Conference had canceled the men's tournament, and the remaining games of the women's tournament. Soon, I learned that conference basketball tournaments were being canceled all over the country, and even the NCAA March Madness tournament was in serious doubt for the first time in its history.

Later, I was to reflect that with the Titans vs. Hawaii women's game concluding around 10:30 p.m. Pacific time, I may have witnessed the final college basketball game that was played in America that season.

Things began to snowball immediately after that: Following a win at the Sacramento State Invitational, the men's golf team learned that the scheduled March 13-14 Grand Canyon University Invitational had been canceled. Fortunately for the squad, they were informed before they left for Phoenix.

In the Titan Athletics department, information and instructions were changing daily, if not hourly. There was initially talk that sports would go on a two-week or so hiatus before resuming.That became impossible when the Big West Conference officially canceled the remaining 2020 athletic schedule on Friday, March 13th.Soon, six-foot distancing rules were put in place, as well as other measures hoped to control the disease.

Athletic Director, Jim Donovan thought back: "I remember the looks on coaches faces and the gasps many of the student-athletes made when we told everyone in an all-staff, all student-athlete meeting in the Titan Volleyball practice facility.

"I specifically remember telling all of them, 'We don't know how long it will be (that we'll be shut down), but we have to do it to save lives' - not necessarily our lives, because the young and healthy seem to weather COVID illness better, but so that our grandparents, the elderly and maybe even our parents would have a better chance to survive (because everyone staying home will slow the spread, and maybe a vaccine would be approved at some point)."

The Titan baseball team would only participate in 20 games, while softball would play in 24 before college sports were called off throughout the nation.

Eventually, the entire Cal State Fullerton campus was closed down, and we, in Athletics Communication, were sent to work at home for an unspecified period of time. After a few lethargic Zoom meetings, and with no current activities to write about, no game tickets to sell, and no student-athletes to work with, several members of the Athletics department, including yours truly, were quietly laid off for an indefinite period of time.

Said Donovan: "One of the hardest things I've had to do in my career, was to lay off 14 full-time and part -time staff because of budget issues."

I was fortunate, and was fairly quickly able to return to my distribution management roots before fully retiring in June, 2023.Donovan added, "I'm beyond proud on how our coaches, staff, and student athletes responded. With Steve DiTolla and Assistant AD, for Sports Medicine, Jaime Potter, taking the lead on our 'Return to Practice Plan,' we were the first of 23 CSU campuses to bring our student-athletes back for practices, with COVID restrictions, in August, 2020.

"About a half dozen other CSU athletics departments, and a few UC campuses, used our Plan as a guide to get approval for their athletics departments to return to campus. Another example of Titans leading the way."

The Fall of 2020 saw the cancelation of women's volleyball, and men's and women's soccer by the Big West Conference before they had a chance to get started. Men's and women's basketball returned in November, but there were several COVID-related cancelations, and spectators were unable to enter historic Titan Gym.

Outdoor sports, baseball and softball, were more successfully able to compete in the latter part of the school year.Baseball managed to complete 55 games, while softball participated in 53. Only very limited spectators were allowed in Goodwin and Anderson Family Fields.

In that whirlwind month of March, 2020, I wrote my first Titan Memories story. While working from home, I wrote six more stories prior to being laid off in April. I had so enjoyed sharing these experiences on the FullertonTitans.com website that Athletics Director, Jim Donovan, graciously agreed to allow me to continue writing more stories as a Volunteer Features Writer. This is my 59th Titan Memories story.

I am also grateful to Bryant Freese, Director of Athletic Communications, for posting the stories in a timely manner, and for finding appropriate pictures to go on the header.

When I reminisce about my time serving on the Titan Athletics staff, I like to remember that my three sports were remarkably successful during my tenure:Women's tennis enjoyed a winning, 7-5 record before they were shut down.Jadie Acidera and Eira Tobrand were an impressive 14-8 and 13-7 respectively in singles play.Women's basketball completed their first winning season since 1990-91, and Raina Perez had been selected as Big West Player of the Year.The men's golf team won two tournaments, and Titan golfers, Derek Castillo and Jack Dyer combined to earn three first place finishes in the seven tournaments that the Titans were able to compete in.

For a year or longer, Titan Athletics had to contend with changing rules and information, COVID testing, online education, and a campus devoid of the hustle and bustle of daily activity. Thanks in large part to Donovan's leadership, things are now largely back to normal, and the university and its resilient sports programs are perhaps stronger than ever.

Read more:

Titan Memories: The COVID-19 Pandemic, Titan Athletics, and Me - California State University, Fullerton - fullertontitans.com

Type 1 diabetes is an autoimmune disease that leads to disrupted glucose metabolism. It requires lifelong insulin therapy. The Global Platform for the Prevention of Autoimmune Diabetes (GPPAD) collaborates within a European network to develop new methods to prevent this condition which is, to date incurable. AVAnT1A is GPPAD's third intervention study. It will investigate whether vaccination against SARS-CoV-2 in the first year of life can protect children who have an increased genetic risk for type 1 diabetes from developing the condition. The study is supported by funding from The Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust.

In Germany, four out of 1000 children are diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, a metabolic disorder triggered by an autoimmune reaction. In individuals with type 1 diabetes, the immune system destroys the insulin-producing cells in the Langerhans islets of the pancreas. Affected individuals require lifelong insulin treatment as insulin plays a vital role in transporting sugar from the blood into the body's cells. Approximately 90 percent of affected children and adolescents have no close relatives with type 1 diabetes, often leading to a late and unexpected diagnosis. However, researchers can identify the underlying autoimmune process long before symptoms occur, based on islet autoantibodies in the blood.

The exact causes of the underlying autoimmune reaction remain unclear. In large-scale, long-term studies, researchers at Helmholtz Munich have identified viral infections in early childhood as a crucial environmental factor for the development of type 1 diabetes. During the COVID-19 pandemic, GPPAD researchers made another important observation: after contracting a SARS-CoV-2 infection, children with an increased risk for type 1 diabetes were more likely to develop islet autoantibodies.

COVID-19 has increased the risk of the disease. We have seen that children who had COVID-19 before age 18 months were around five times more likely to develop the islet autoantibodies as those who were not infected."

Prof. Ezio Bonifacio, GPPAD researcher at the Center for Regenerative Therapies Dresden (CRTD) of TUD Dresden University of Technology

These autoantibodies are biomarkers indicating the beginning of the autoimmune process that leads to type 1 diabetes.

In a new study, GPPAD aims to further investigate this relationship. The AVAnT1A Study - short for "AntiViral Action against Type 1 Autoimmunity" - examines whether vaccination against COVID-19 at the age of six months can prevent the development of islet autoantibodies in babies at increased genetic risk of developing type 1 diabetes, thus reducing their risk of developing the condition. The vaccine used is safe and approved for children aged six months and older. The participating children are randomly assigned to two groups beforehand using a randomized, placebo-controlled study design. The intervention group will receive the COVID-19 vaccine, the control group will receive a placebo injection without active ingredients. The vaccine is provided by the Center for Pandemic Vaccines and Therapeutics (ZEPAI) at the Paul-Ehrlich-Institute, Federal Institute for Vaccines and Biomedicines. Additionally, the study is double-blinded, so the researchers, the study personnel, and the families, will not know which group a child belongs to until the study is completed.

"Since many infections in young children occur almost without symptoms, we also ask participating families to collect saliva and stool samples from their children at regular intervals," explains Prof. Anette-Gabriele Ziegler, Director of the Helmholtz Munich Institute for Diabetes Research and GPPAD, Chair of Diabetes and Gestational Diabetes at Klinikum rechts der Isar and Technical University of Munich. From these samples, researchers can identify which viruses the children had contact with. This allows the researchers to clarify further connections between type 1 diabetes and viral infections in early childhood.

"With a planned number of 2252 participants, the AVAnT1A Study is the largest intervention study to date exploring the relationship between type 1 diabetes and early childhood viral infections. Insights generated with this study will help us to move closer to our goal of a world without type 1 diabetes," says Prof. Sandra Hummel, lead scientist in the AVAnT1A study and researcher at Helmholtz Munich. Children with an increased genetic risk for developing type 1 diabetes are invited to participate in the AVAnT1A study. Their increased risk is detected within the newborn screening called "Freder1k", which for Germany is offered in Bavaria, Lower Saxony, Saxony, and Thuringia. Parents can test their newborns either directly at the birth clinic or in the pediatrician's office until six weeks of age. A tiny drop of blood from the umbilical cord or heel is sufficient for this test.

Children participating in the AVAnT1A study are invited for regular check-ups until their sixth birthday. The families benefit from participating in an early detection program for type 1 diabetes. If a child shows initial signs of the autoimmune disease, this can be detected early in the disease progression, ensuring families access to optimal support and information to support their child.

"This study holds promise to help tease out the link between viral infections and the development of autoimmunity in type 1 diabetes;" says Anne Koralova, Program Officer at the Helmsley Charitable Trust. "The investigators at GPPAD have done incredible work studying strategies to prevent the development of type 1 diabetes, and Helmsley is committed to supporting these innovative studies."

Following the POInT Study (short for: Primary Oral Insulin Trial) and the SINT1A Study (short for: Supplementation with B. INfantis for Mitigation of Type 1 Diabetes Autoimmunity), AVAnT1A is now GPPAD's third intervention study aimed at developing new preventive measures for type 1 diabetes. The POInT Study investigated whether the administration of insulin powder in the first three years of life has a protective effect on the immune system. The study will be completed in 2024. Participants in the SINT1A Study receive a probiotic in the first year of life, which aims to positively influence the microbiome and thus prevent autoimmune reactions. The SINT1A study achieved full recruitment in March 2024. The GPPAD research platform, and all studies supported within it, are financed by The Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust in the U.S.

See the article here:

AVAnT1A study: Investigating early COVID-19 vaccination and type 1 diabetes risk in children - News-Medical.Net

The COVID-19 lull in the U.S. may soon come to an end, as a new family of SARS-CoV-2 variantsnicknamed FLiRT variantsbegins to spread nationwide.

These variants are distant Omicron relatives that spun out from JN.1, the variant behind the surge in cases this past winter. Theyve been dubbed FLiRT variants based on the technical names for their mutations, one of which includes the letters F and L, and another of which includes the letters R and T.

Within the FLiRT family, one variant in particular has risen to prominence: KP.2, which accounted for about 25% of new sequenced cases during the two weeks ending Apr. 27, according to data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Other FLiRT variants, including KP.1.1, have not become as widespread in the U.S. yet.

Researchers are still learning about the FLiRT variants, and many questions remain about how quickly theyll spread, whether theyll cause disease thats more or less severe than what weve seen previously, and how well vaccines will stand up to them. Heres what we know so far.

Despite KP.2's rise in the U.S., its too soon to tell whether the FLiRT family will be responsible for a major surge in cases, says Dr. Eric Topol, executive vice president at Scripps Research, who wrote about the FLiRT variants in a recent edition of his newsletter. For now, the amount of SARS-CoV-2 virus in U.S. wastewater remains minimal, according to the CDC, and hospitalizations and deaths have also continued to decline steadily since their recent peaks in January. At the global level, case counts rose from early to mid-April, but remain far lower than they were a few months ago.

KP.2 and its relatives will likely cause an uptick in cases, but my hunch is it wont be a big wave, Topol says. It might be a wavelet. Thats because people who were recently infected by the JN.1 variant seem to have some protection against reinfection, Topol says, and the virus hasnt mutated enough to become wildly different from previous strains. A recent study from researchers in Japan, which was posted online before being peer-reviewed, also found that KP.2 is less infectious than JN.1.

Vaccines still provide good protection against COVID-19-related hospitalization and death. But two preliminary studiesthe one from Japan and another from researchers in China, which was also posted online before being peer-reviewedsuggest the FLiRT variants may be better at dodging immune protection from vaccines than JN.1 was.

That isnt good, Topol says, especially since many people who got the most recent boosterroughly 30% of adults in the U.S. got it last fall, meaning their protection has begun to wane.

In an Apr. 26 statement, the World Health Organization recommended basing future vaccine formulations on the JN.1 lineage, since it seems the virus will continue to evolve from that variant. The most recent booster was based on an older strain, XBB.1.5.

The virus continues to evolve, but public-health advice remains the same: stay up-to-date on vaccines, test before gatherings, stay home when you're ill, and consider masking and avoiding crowded indoor areas, especially when lots of COVID-19 is going around.

Read more:

What to Know About the 'FLiRT' Variants of COVID-19 - TIME

Don't just sneeze without a tissue! That's the message of this early pandemic era graffiti in Dakar, Senegal. The World Health Organization has just issued an updated report on the way SARS-CoV-2 spreads. Take our quiz to see if you're up on your COVID terminology. Seyllou/AFP via Getty Images hide caption

Don't just sneeze without a tissue! That's the message of this early pandemic era graffiti in Dakar, Senegal. The World Health Organization has just issued an updated report on the way SARS-CoV-2 spreads. Take our quiz to see if you're up on your COVID terminology.

The arrival of SARS-CoV-2, the virus responsible for COVID-19, brought a batch of vocabulary into the public eye, from "fomite" to "social distancing." See our guide from 2020.

And now there's a new report from the World Health Organization that proposes a set of new terms and definitions along with a revised way of thinking about pathogens that transmit through the air.

Jeremy Farrar, chief scientist of WHO, considers the document to be a kind of base camp. With a shared vocabulary and approach, he and his colleagues are trying to get public health professionals on the same page to reduce confusion and streamline the containment of infections in the future.

This is needed because transmission is complicated. "It depends on my immunity. It depends on your immunity," says Farrar. "It depends on the humidity. It depends on the size of the room. It depends on the airflow. It depends whether I've been vaccinated or whether I'm immune. Depends on my age. Depends on whether I've got diabetes or I've got other conditions. It's complicated."

NPR has prepared a quiz to test your knowledge of this new thinking and how WHO is hoping it will be used.

Originally posted here:

QUIZ: Can you pass this test on current theories about how SARS-CoV-2 spreads? : Goats and Soda - NPR