G7 split on reallocating $100 billion IMF funds to COVID-hit nations

 Group of Seven leaders were trying to resolve differences over a proposal to reallocate $100 billion from the International Monetary Fund's warchest to help countries struggling to cope with the COVID-19 crisis.

An almost final version of the G7 communique seen by Reuters showed Germany and Italy had yet to back the inclusion of the $100 billion figure in the final statement by leaders.

The IMF's members agreed in April to a $650 billion increase in IMF's Special Drawing Rights and the G7 countries are considering whether to reallocate $100 billion of their rights to help poor countries fight the COVID pandemic.

SDRs are the IMF's reserve asset, and are exchangeable for dollars, euros, sterling, yen and Chinese yuan or renminbi. Member states can loan or donate their SDR reserves to other countries for their use.

The head of the IMF, Kristalina Georgieva, told reporters on the sidelines of the summit that she had been heartened by the G7's support for the plan and that she expected a clear indication later on how best to proceed, adding that the $100 billion target had been in discussion.

https://news.yahoo.com/g7-split-reallocating-100-billion-101925717.html

Germany demands that J&J make up COVID-19 vaccine gap in July

 Germany's health ministry said Johnson & Johnson must deliver 6.5 million COVID-19 vaccine doses to Germany in July to make up for a shortfall expected in June after the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) told the company to dispose of millions of doses because of contamination concerns.

"This is regrettable because each dose counts," a ministry spokesman said on Sunday in response to an enquiry by Reuters. "We therefore expect from J&J that this amount is delivered in July as quickly as possible."

Without disclosing or confirming the number of vaccine doses affected, the FDA said in a news release that it had authorised two batches of the vaccine for use, that several other batches were not suitable for use and that others were being evaluated.

A media report citing sources familiar with the matter had said 60 million J&J doses must be discarded, and two sources familiar with the situation told Reuters that about 10 million doses had been cleared by the agency.

The delivery gap hits Germany hard.

J&J had been due to deliver 10.1 million doses of its one-shot vaccine in the second quarter, the ministry said.

The ministry spokesman said that Germany will receive 50.3 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine in the second quarter, Moderna would ship 6.4 million and AstraZeneca 12.4 million, all fulfilling their supply commitments.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/1-germany-demands-j-j-094850799.html

EU adds another rare blood condition as side effect of AstraZeneca COVID-19 shot

 Europe's drug regulator on Friday (Jun 11) identified another rare blood condition as a potential side effect of AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine and said it was looking into cases of heart inflammation after inoculation with all coronavirus shots.

The European Medicines Agency's (EMA) safety committee said that capillary leak syndrome must be added as a new side effect to labelling on AstraZeneca's vaccine, known as Vaxzevria.

People who had previously sustained the condition, where fluids leak from the smallest blood vessels causing swelling and a drop in blood pressure, should not receive the shot, the EMA added.

The regulator first began looking into these cases in April and the recommendation adds to AstraZeneca's woes after its vaccine was associated with very rare and potentially lethal cases of blood clotting that come with a low platelet count.

Last month, the EMA had advised against using the second AstraZeneca shot for people with that clotting condition, known as thrombosis with thrombocytopenia syndrome (TTS).

The committee reviewed six validated cases of capillary leak syndrome in people, mostly women, who had received Vaxzevria, including one death. Three had had a history of the condition.

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/world/covid-19-vaccine-heart-inflammation-blood-myocarditis-14994524

Russia tests COVID-19 vaccine as nasal spray for children

 Russia has tested a nasal spray form of its COVID-19 vaccine that is suitable for children aged 8-12, and plans to launch the new product in September, the scientist who led the development of the Sputnik V vaccine said on Saturday.

Alexander Gintsburg, who heads the Gamaleya Institute that developed Sputnik V, said the spray for children used the same vaccine "only instead of a needle, a nozzle is put on", the TASS news agency reported.

The children's shot is expected to be ready for distribution by Sept. 15, Gintsburg was quoted as saying during a meeting with President Vladimir Putin.

The research group tested the vaccine on children aged between eight and 12 and found no side effects among the test group, including no increase in body temperature, Gintsburg said in comments reported by the TASS news agency.

"We are inoculating our little (patients) nasally, we are just administering the same vaccine as a nasal spray," Gintsburg said, without giving further details about the study such as how many children were involved. 

https://news.trust.org/item/20210612125047-wt9az/

CRISPR diagnostics

 

Omar O. Abudayyeh, 

Jonathan S. Gootenberg

DOI: 10.1126/science.abi9335

PDF: 

https://science.sciencemag.org/content/372/6545/914/tab-pdf

Summary

Although clinical diagnostics take many forms, nucleic acid–based testing has become the gold standard for sensitive detection of many diseases, including pathogenic infections. Quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) has been widely adopted for its ability to detect only a few DNA or RNA molecules that can unambiguously specify a particular disease. However, the complexity of this technique restricts application to laboratory settings. The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) pandemic has underscored the need for the development and deployment of nucleic acid tests that are economical, easily scaled, and capable of being run in low-resource settings, without sacrifices in speed, sensitivity or specificity. CRISPR-based diagnostic (CRISPR-dx) tools offer a solution, and multiple CRISPR-dx products for detection of the SARS-CoV-2 RNA genome have been authorized by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). On page 941 of this issue, Jiao et al. (1) describe a new CRISPR-based tool to distinguish several SARS-CoV-2 variants in a single reaction.

http://www.sciencemag.org/about/science-licenses-journal-article-reuse

https://science.sciencemag.org/content/372/6545/914

Cell-mediated immunity in people with long COVID

 Nerea Montes, Èlia Domènech, Sílvia Guerrero, Bárbara Oliván-Blázquez, Rosa Magallón-Botalla

doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.06.09.21258553

This article is a preprint and has not been certified by peer review [what does this mean?]. It reports new medical research that has yet to be evaluated and so should not be used to guide clinical practice.

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.06.09.21258553v1.full.pdf

Abstract

Introduction The objective of this study is to analyse the specific immune response against SARS-CoV-2 in those affected by Long Covid (LC), attributable to T cells (cell-mediated immunity) and to carry out a parallel analysis of the humoral response and lymphocyte typing.

Methodology Descriptive cross-sectional study of 74 patients with LC for at least 4 months since diagnosis. The collected data were: information on the COVID-19 episode and the persistent symptoms, medical history and a specific cell-mediated immunity to SARS-CoV-2 through flow cytometry, assessing the release of interferon-gamma (IFN-Ɣ) by T4 lymphocytes, T8 lymphocytes and NK cells. Descriptive and comparative analyses were carried out.

Results Patients with LC had negative serology for Covid-19 in 89% of cases but 96% showed specific cellular immunity to SARS-CoV-2 an average of 9.5 months after infection: 89% of this response corresponded to T8 lymphocytes, 58% to NK cells, and 51% to T4 lymphocyte (20% negligibly positive). Most of them had altered immune cell typing and we found that T4 lymphocyte counts were low in 34% of cases and NK cell high in 64%. Macrophage populations were detected in the peripheral blood of 7% of them. Patients displayed a higher percentage of illnesses related to &[Prime]abnormal&[Prime] immune responses, either preceding SARS-CoV-2 infection (43%) or following it in 23% of cases.

Conclusion The immune system appears to have an important involvement in the development of LC and viral persistence could be the cause or consequence of it. Further analysis with a control group should be performed.

Competing Interest Statement

The authors have declared no competing interest.

Funding Statement

No funding was granted for this study. Serologic tests were funded by each of the participants themselves. Participants have not received any financial benefit and took part in this study in order to further research into LC.

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.06.09.21258553v1

Highly-specific memory B cell generation after 2nd dose of BNT162b2 vaccine compensate for decline of serum antibodies, absence of mucosal IgA

 Eva Piano Mortari, Cristina Russo, Maria Rosaria Vinci, Sara Terreri, Ane Fernandez Salinas, Livia Piccioni, Claudia Alteri, Luna Colagrossi, Luana Coltella, Stefania Ranno, Giulia Linardos, Marilena Agosta, Christian Albano, Chiara Agrati, Concetta Castilletti, Silvia Meschi, Paolo Romania, Giuseppe Roscilli, Emiliano Pavoni, Vincenzo Camisa, Annapaola Santoro, Rita Brugaletta, Nicola Magnavita, Alessandra Ruggiero, Nicola Cotugno, Donato Amodio, Marta Luisa Ciofi Degli Atti, Daniela Giorgio, Nicoletta Russo, Guglielmo Salvatori, Tiziana Corsetti, Franco Locatelli, Carlo Federico Perno, Salvatore Zaffina, Rita Carsetti

doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.06.08.21258284

This article is a preprint and has not been certified by peer review [what does this mean?]. It reports new medical research that has yet to be evaluated and so should not be used to guide clinical practice.

PDF: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.06.08.21258284v1.full.pdf

Abstract

Specific memory B cells and antibodies are reliable read-out of vaccine efficacy. We analyzed these biomarkers after one and two doses of BNT162b2 vaccine. The second dose significantly increases the level of highly-specific memory B cells and antibodies. Two months after the second dose, specific antibody levels decline, but highly specific memory B cells continue to increase thus predicting a sustained protection from COVID-19.

Competing Interest Statement

The authors have declared no competing interest.

Funding Statement

This work was founded by: Italian Ministry of Health RF2013-02358960 grant Italian Ministry of Health COVID-2020-12371817 grant Ricerca Corrente 2021 5 per mille

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.06.08.21258284v1