Novacyt wins French approval for COVID testing kit

Novacyt’s COVID-19 diagnostic test has been approved by France’s CNR arm of the Institut Pasteur, making it available for immediate distribution in France, the healthcare company said on Monday.
The company added that last week, it had also won approval for its COVID-19 test from Thailand’s Ministry of Health.
Novacyt has already won orders in the UK for its Primerdesign COVID-19 detection kit and has won regulatory approval for it from the U.S. Food & Drug Administration.
“The Institut Pasteur’s evaluation and approval of our COVID-19 test is an important validation … We look forward to supporting the French authorities in their COVID-19 testing requirements,” said Novacyt CEO Graham Mullis.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-novacyt/novacyt-wins-french-approval-for-covid-testing-kit-idUSKBN21O0GL

UK’s plan B if ‘Team Johnson’ is incapacitated

Britain’s constitution offers no clear answer to the question now on many Britons’ minds: what happens if Prime Minister Boris Johnson, undergoing tests in hospital after persistent symptoms of coronavirus, cannot continue to lead.

Johnson was admitted to hospital on Sunday in what his office said was a “precautionary step” after testing positive 10 days ago and still suffering from a high temperature. He remains in charge of the government, his office said.
Johnson has said he can keep working from self-isolation in his Downing Street residence, just as his health secretary, Matt Hancock, who also tested positive for the virus, has done.
But the fact that two such crucial leaders in the UK’s fight against the pandemic have contracted the disease has raised questions about how the government would function without them at a time of global crisis.
The constitution — an unwieldy collection of sometimes ancient and contradictory precedents — offers no clear, formal “Plan B” or succession scenario, experts said.
“We’ve not been in that kind of situation, we’ve not had to think about it from that point of view before,” Catherine Haddon, a senior fellow at the Institute for Government, told Reuters soon after Johnson was first diagnosed.
Whereas in the United States the vice president steps up if the president dies or becomes incapacitated, Britain has no formal deputy or caretaker prime minister who would take over.
Downing Street has already said, however, that Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab would deputise if necessary.
Nor is there any guidance for such circumstances in the Cabinet Manual which sets out the rules and conventions for the running of government, and there is little precedence.
When asked about who would stand in for the prime minister, his spokesman said: “The prime minister has the power to delegate responsibility to any of his ministers, but for now it is the prime minister and then the foreign secretary.”

CHURCHILL’S STROKE

In June 1953, then-Prime Minister Winston Churchill suffered a stroke while in office. His illness was kept so secret that some senior ministers were unaware.
Churchill surprised doctors by recovering to carry on his duties, returning to Downing Street and running the cabinet two months later.
More recently, Tony Blair twice underwent treatment for a heart condition while prime minister in the early 2000s, each time briefly cutting back on his workload for a couple of days.

Officials said that if Blair were to have been incapacitated, his then-deputy John Prescott would have taken over until a new leader was elected.
There is no suggestion Johnson is unable to perform his job. Since his diagnosis, he has carried on leading the government’s efforts through the use of teleconferencing.

MUDDLE THROUGH?

Bob Kerslake, head of the civil service from January 2012 to September 2014, said Johnson’s role was crucial at this time, stressing that visible leadership was essential.
Kerslake, speaking to Sky News last month after Johnson tested positive, said officials would need to know what would happen if senior ministers were unable to do their jobs.
Losing Cabinet Office minister Michael Gove, who coordinates policy across government, would be a serious blow.
“He is critical to all of this,” Kerslake said. “If, for whatever reason, he was ill, who takes over from him?”
Haddon from the Institute for Government said some powers were specifically vested in cabinet ministers, so there was an issue of what happened if they were unavailable.

“If you got to a stage where … you had secretaries of state who aren’t able to perform their functions, then there are question marks about whether junior ministers in their department act on their behalf,” she said.
One lawmaker in Johnson’s party, who has repeatedly tried to bring in a law to formalise who would replace a prime minister in the event of incapacity, said last month that no one seemed to know what would happen.
“In a national emergency, you don’t want to be scrabbling around worrying about who’s in charge,” Peter Bone told the Mirror newspaper.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-britain-johnson-il/uks-plan-b-if-team-johnson-is-incapacitated-answer-is-unclear-idUSKBN21N0XI

Japan to declare state of emergency for about a month: PM

Japan is to declare a state of emergency in Tokyo and six other prefectures as early as Tuesday in a bid to stop the coronavirus, the prime minister said, with the government preparing a stimulus package to soften the economic blow.
More than 3,500 people have tested positive for the coronavirus in Japan and 85 have died – not a huge outbreak compared with some hot spots, but the numbers keep rising with particular alarm over the spread in Tokyo, which has more than 1,000 cases, including 83 new ones on Monday.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe made the announcement on the state of emergency in remarks to media televised live.

An emergency, which Abe said would last about a month, will give governors authority to call on people to stay at home and businesses to close, but not to order the kind of lockdowns seen in other countries. In most cases, there are no penalties for ignoring requests, and enforcement will rely more on peer pressure and respect for authority.
Pressure had been mounting on the government to take the step although Abe has voiced concern about being too hasty, given the restrictions on movement and businesses that would ensue.
The stimulus package of hundreds of billions of dollars is due to be rolled out this week.

An emergency would appear to have public support. In a poll published on Monday by JNN, run by broadcaster TBS, 80% of those surveyed said Abe should declare it while 12% said it was not necessary. His approval rating fell by 5.7 points from last month to 43.2%, the survey showed.
Kenji Shibuya, director of the Institute for Public Health at King’s College, London, said the emergency was too late given the explosive increase in cases in Tokyo.
“It should have been declared by April 1 at the latest,” he said.

CALL FOR CALM

Sounding alarm over the high rate of cases that could not be traced, Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike indicated last week that she would favour a state of emergency as a way to help her urge residents to adhere to stronger social-distancing measures.
An expert on the government’s coronavirus panel said Japan could avoid an explosive rise by reducing person-to-person contact by 80%.
Under a law revised in March to cover the coronavirus, the prime minister can declare a state of emergency if the disease poses a “grave danger” to lives and if its rapid spread could have a big impact on the economy.
Economy Minister Yasutoshi Nishimura called for calm saying there was no need for people in designated prefectures to flee to other regions, which could spread infections, NHK reported.

While Japan’s coronavirus epidemic is dwarfed by the 335,000 infections and more than 9,500 deaths in the United States alone, experts worry a sudden surge could overwhelm Japan’s medical system.
Abe must seek formal advice from a panel of experts before deciding to go ahead and declare the emergency.
Governors in Tokyo and elsewhere have asked citizens to stay home on weekends, avoid crowds and evening outings, and work from home. That has had some effect, but not as much as many experts said was needed.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-japan/japan-to-declare-state-of-emergency-for-about-a-month-pm-idUSKBN21N0ZS

Oil pares big losses as Saudis, Russia near deal

Down by nearly 11% at one point during the night, oil has now pared most of its losses.

Russia and Saudi Arabia are “very, very close” to a deal on production cuts, said Kirill Dmitriev, CEO of Russia’s sovereign wealth fund RDIF.

“I think the whole market understands that this deal is important… and to bring stability in a world that is about to see probably the greatest recession ever.”

Dmitriev and Energy Minister Alexander Novak were Russia’s top negotiators in the initial output cut deal with OPEC that expired on March 31.

Crude futures -1.5% to $27.92/bbl.

https://seekingalpha.com/news/3558468-oil-pares-big-losses-saudis-russia-near-deal

FEMA sending 1,700 ventilators to hot spots: coronavirus briefing

FEMA will be sending 500 additional ventilators to New Jersey, 200 to Louisiana, 300 to Michigan, 600 to Illinois and 100 to Massachusetts, President Trump said at the White House coronavirus task force briefing.

The state of Washington has returned 400 ventilators.

It will also be setting up a federal medical station in Washington, DC, to help the city deal with the coronavirus pandemic, he said.

The U.S. has purchased “a lot of hydroxychloroquine,” he said. “We have purchased and stockpiled 29M pills (doses).”

Update at 7:18 PM: Trump said he’ll take care of the airplane and airline industries.

“We’re starting to see light at the end of the tunnel. Things are starting to happen,” he said.

Today was the first day that the deaths from COVID-19 are fewer than the previous day — “perhaps that’s a good sign.”

7:20 PM: He adds that the legislation to provide relief to individuals and business is very successful. “We may have to make it larger.”

7:25 PM: S&P 500 futures are up 1.6%.

Worldwide, there are 1.27M confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 69,309 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University; in the U.S., there are 335,524 confirmed cases and 9,562 deaths.

7:30 PM: Rear Admiral John Polowczyk said that the government is directing supplies to impacted areas’ public , VA and private hospitals, and nursing homes and acute care facilities.

“We’re also working to push out millions of doses” of hydroxychloroquine to impacted areas, he said.

VA hospitals will make hospital beds at its facilities available to some of the hardest hit areas.

7:35 PM: “We’ve seen a trend of some leveling” in talking with governors, Vice President Mike Pence said. “We’re beginning to see losses and cases and hospitalizations beginning to stabilize.”

7:43 PM: Speaking about health-care workers who are facing great risks, “we’re talking about doing something for them,” Trump said, but he wants to wait until “this is over.”

(Some people have suggested that health-care workers should get hazard pay.)

7:54 PM: Dr. Deborah Birx, the White House coronavirus task force response coordinator, said she’s seen another model where the number of deaths in the U.S. comes closer to 100K; about a week ago, models were projecting 100K-240K deaths.

8:00 PM: Trump said he would impose tariffs on foreign oil if he had to to save the U.S. oil industry. “Yeah, I’d do tariffs, very substantial tariffs,” he said.

Related tickers: XOM, COP, CVX, OXY, APA

8:04 PM: Part of the reason Trump would like to do an infrastructure plan is because interest rate are almost zero, he said.

He also said he likes the idea of additional stimulus checks.

8:10 PM: Pence said there are about 18,000 machines already around the country that that can conduct the Abbott Laboratories (NYSE:ABT) 15-minute coronavirus tests; FEMA has purchased 1,200 of the devices, which will be distributed across the country, he said.

8:18 PM: When asked how the task force warning that this week will be one of the worst weeks in terms of coronavirus deaths squares with seeing a “light at the end of the tunnel,” Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, explains that there’s a lag between cases leveling off and the number of deaths.

What happens this week reflects what was happening about two weeks ago, he said.

8:22 PM: Briefing ends. S&P futures are up 1.6%.

https://seekingalpha.com/news/3558463-fema-sending-1700-ventilators-to-hot-spots-coronavirus-briefing

Stocks are set to jump at Monday’s open, Dow futures rise more than 200

U.S. stock futures rose on Sunday night as Wall Street tried to recover from another decline last week while investors shook off rising tensions between Saudi Arabia and Russia.
Dow Jones Industrial Average futures traded more than 200 points higher, or 1.1%. S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 futures also climbed more than 1%.

Last week, the major averages posted their third weekly decline in four. The Dow slid 2.7% while the S&P 500 lost 2.1%. The Nasdaq Composite closed last week down 1.7%. Stocks are also deep in bear-market territory as concerns over the coronavirus outbreak have virtually shut down the global economy and have dampened sentiment around corporate profits.
However, some on Wall Street think the market could start to turn a corner soon.
Bill Ackman, founder of Pershing Square Capital Management, said in a series of tweets he is “beginning to get optimistic.” He said cases in New York, a hot spot for the coronavirus in the U.S., “appear to be peaking” while some treatments “appear to help.”
“If this is true, the severity and death rate could be much lower than anticipated, and we could be closer to herd immunity than projected,” Ackman also said. “While it is hard to be positive when we know that tens of thousands more will die and many more will get severely sick, I have no choice but to be more optimistic about the intermediate future based on the data and facts I have seen recently.”
Last month, Ackman called for the U.S. to completely shut down for 30 days as a way to curb the coronavirus outbreak. “Hell is coming,” Ackman told CNBC’s “Halftime Report” on March 18.
The number of coronavirus-related hospitalizations has fallen slightly in New York while discharges are up, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Sunday. Italy also reported Sunday its smallest daily increase in deaths in two weeks.
To be sure, the number of coronavirus cases continues to increase sharply. More than 1.2 million coronavirus cases have been confirmed, according to Johns Hopkins University. The U.S. is by far the country with the most cases at over 330,000. On Saturday, Trump warned “there will be a lot of death,” noting the U.S. faces its “toughest week” in its fight against the virus.
Marc Chaikin, CEO of Chaikin Analytics, advises investors to remain cautious.
“Until the spread of the COVID-19 virus peaks and we are closer to a reopening of the U.S. economy, sell rallies and sit on your cash,” said Chaikin. “If we are fortunate to see an effective treatment there will be plenty of capital gains opportunities. For me, capital preservation is more important than capital gains.”
Stock futures shook off a massive decline in oil prices as a key meeting between major oil producing countries was delayed. U.S. crude fell more than 8% to $26.04 per barrel.
The meeting between OPEC and Russia was scheduled for Monday, but sources familiar with the matter told CNBC it will “likely” take place Thursday. The delay comes after President Donald Trump told CNBC last week he expected both countries to cut production by up to 15 million barrels.
Trump’s comments helped U.S. crude post its biggest-ever weekly gain. West Texas Intermediate futures rallied 12% last week. WTI also jumped 24% on Thursday for its best day on record, lifting equity prices that day as concern about financial and job losses in the energy sector eased.
Crude has taken a beating this year as Saudi Arabia-led OPEC and Russia failed to reach a deal on production cuts while the global spread of the coronavirus dampens the demand outlook for oil. Year to date, WTI has lost more than half of its value.
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/04/05/stock-market-futures-open-to-close-news.html

UK’s Izana Bioscience tests rheumatoid arthritis drug in COVID-19 patients

UK-based biopharma company Izana Bioscience said it was testing its antibody therapy namilumab for the treatment of patients with rapidly worsening COVID-19 at the Humanitas Research Hospitals in Bergamo and Milan in Italy.
Namilumab is a monoclonal antibody therapy currently in late-stage clinical development for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis and ankylosing spondylitis.
It targets a white cell growth factor called GM-CSF, which has been found in higher levels in COVID-19 patients, according to recent data from China, Izana Bioscience said. Early intervention could therefore be beneficial for patients with COVID-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus.

Chief executive and co-founder Someit Sidhu said: “The role of GM-CSF in immune-mediated diseases is backed by a strong body of evidence and our growing understanding of COVID-19.
“Evidence suggests that anti GM-CSF therapy has the potential to change the way patients’ immune systems respond to the virus, and therefore to reduce dangerous inflammation and support recovery.”
The compassionate use programme is led by Professor Carlo Selmi, Izana said, while research services are being provided by Ergomed. Japan’s Takeda has a strategic equity stake in Izana.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-therapy-izana/uks-izana-bioscience-tests-rheumatoid-arthritis-drug-in-covid-19-patients-idUSKBN21N0Z9