Cuban coffee at Versailles in Little Havana in MIami
Good morning. This is Jonathan Spira reporting. Here now the news of the pandemic from across the globe on the 1,305th day of the pandemic.
OP-ED ON THE WEEKEND
If You Felt Unwell After Your Covid Shot, Then It’s Probably Working to Protect You
A new study found that feeling unwell after your coronavirus vaccine shot is good news and means it’s working.
I’ve had all sorts of reactions to the various coronavirus jabs I’ve gotten, ranging from just plain flu-like to being woken up twice in the morning at 6 a.m. (not an hour I’m usually waking up) feeling as if an anvil had been dropped on the top of my head.
It was as if I were in a cartoon and I was the animated character who had been stunned with blunt head trauma by an anvil. There was a “halo” of twittering birds orbiting my head. Two days in a row.
After last Saturday’s jab, I only felt a little discomfort in my right deltoid. By means of explanation, the vaccine is injected into your arm muscle, stretches the muscle fibers, and triggers an immune response, leading to temporary inflammation and discomfort.
The study, The More Symptoms the Better? Covid-19 Vaccine Side Effects and Long-Term Neutralizing Antibody Response, holds that fever, chills, and fatigue among other symptoms are likely signs of vigorous antibody production. The study was posted on the medRxiv preprint server and has not yet been peer reviewed, although its findings are consistent with those from other research.
The researchers behind the study – the lead researchers were Ethan Dutcher, Elissa Epel, and Ashley Mason, all from the Department of Psychiatric and Behavioral Sciences at the University of California, San Francisco – want to help reframe the debate about vaccines by positioning the side-effects as “desirable.”
“We found that certain symptoms (chills, tiredness, feeling unwell, and headache) after the second dose were associated with increases in nAB [neutralizing antibodies] at 1 and 6 months post-vaccination, to roughly 140-160% the level of individuals without each symptom,” the researchers said in the study. “Each additional symptom predicted a 1.1-fold nAB increase. Greater changes in skin temperature and heart rate after the second dose predicted higher nAB levels. Skin temperature had a stronger predictive relationship for 6-month than 1-month nAB level.”
It’s important to note that not having any side-effects does not at all imply that the vaccine isn’t working, but those individuals (such as myself) who have been through the wringer (the wringer being a reference to obsolete laundry machine tools where a wringer would wring out large amounts of water from an item of clothing leaving it merely damp versus soaking wet).
When the coronavirus vaccines were first introduced, people were cautioned not to take nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs such as aspirin or ibuprofen, because they had been found to severely impair immune response in mice. Later studies found this did not carry over to humans, however.
In other news we report today, other viruses besides SARS-CoV-2 may cause Long Covid-like conditions and the pandemic may have killed off a strain of influenza that was circulating worldwide.
LONG COVID
Researchers at the Queen Mary University of London found that there may be long-lasting and potentially serious health implications from other respiratory infections, such as the common cold, that currently go unrecognized.
“Post-acute infection syndromes are not a new phenomenon; indeed, many cases of chronic fatigue syndrome are reported to follow an infection-like episode,” the scientists said in the introduction to the journal article. “Nonetheless, these syndromes often go undiagnosed owing to the wide range of symptoms and lack of diagnostic tests.”
A new study shows that SARS-CoV-2 can directly infect the arteries of the heart and cause the fatty plaque inside arteries to become highly inflamed, thereby increasing the risk of heart attack and stroke. The study – funded by the National Institutes of Health – was published in the journal Nature Cardiovascular Research. The findings should help explain why certain people who get the virus have a greater chance of developing cardiovascular disease, or when they already have it, develop additional heart-related complications.
UNITED STATES
A Florida family of four that operated a business masquerading as a church was found sentenced to prison, each for several years, for selling a bleach product as a Covid-19 “cure-all.”
In July of this year, a federal jury in Miami found four members of the Grenon family guilty of defrauding the United States by distributing a toxic bleaching agent as a Covid-19 cure, , the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida said in a statement.
Mark Grenon of Bradenton, Florida., and one of his adult sons, Joseph Grenon, were sentenced to five years in prison for conspiring to defraud the government. The two other sons, Jonathan Grenon and Jordan Grenon, were sentenced to 12 years and seven months in prison for defrauding the government and contempt of court.
The four were convicted of promoting and selling “Miracle Mineral Solution,” which “when mixed, develops into a dangerous bleach which has caused serious and potentially life-threatening side effects,” according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
We reported in March of this year that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has been warning consumers about MMS since 2010, yet more and more Americans – tens of thousands of people who have no health insurance, were turning to MMS as a “trusted health solution.”
“The Grenons poisoned thousands of people with their bogus miracle cure, which was nothing more than industrial bleach,” said Michael Homer, the assistant U.S. attorney who prosecuted the case, in a statement. “They targeted vulnerable people who were suffering from life-threatening illnesses and who were desperate for a cure.”
The pandemic appears to have killed off a flu strain that is currently part of the annual flu shot. On Thursday, a Food and Drug Administration advisory panel voted unanimously to remove, “as soon as possible,” a component of the vaccine that targets the B/Yamagata strain. This strain appears to have become extinct over the course of the pandemic. It previously circulated worldwide.
After more than three years since its disappearance, infectious disease specialists are confident in saying it presents a low risk of infection.
OTHER HEALTHCARE NEWS
The largest healthcare strike in U.S. history ended after 72 hours as both sides agreed to more negotiations, although union leaders warned that more walkouts were possible. Some 75,000 workers including nurses, radiology technicians, and ultrasound sonographers were on the picket lines.
The acting U.S. Secretary of Labor, Julie Su, played a role as mediator at an all-night negotiating session last week,said she would will return to California to “assist the parties in advancing talks,” the Labor Department announced.
GLOBAL STATISTICS
Now here are the daily statistics for Saturday, October 7.
As of Saturday morning, the world has recorded 696.3 million Covid-19 cases, an increase of .05 million, and 6.92 million deaths, according to Worldometer, a service that tracks such information. In addition, 668.25 million people worldwide have recovered from the virus, an increase of .07 million.
The reader should note that infrequent reporting from some sources may appear as spikes in new case figures or death tolls.
Worldwide, the number of active coronavirus cases as of Saturday at press time is 21,122,709, a decrease of 14,000. Out of that figure, 99.8%, 21,084,639, are considered mild, and 0.2%, or 38,070, are listed as critical. The percentage of cases considered critical has not changed over the past eight months.
Since the start of the pandemic, the United States has, as of Saturday, recorded 108.83 million cases, a higher figure than any other country, and a death toll of 1.18 million. India has the world’s second highest number of officially recorded cases, 45 million, and a reported death toll of 531,930.
The newest data from Russia’s Rosstat state statistics service showed that, at the end of July 2022, the number of Covid or Covid-related deaths since the start of the pandemic there in April 2020 is now 823,623, giving the country the world’s second highest pandemic-related death toll, behind the United States. Rosstat last reported that 3,284 people died from the coronavirus or related causes in July 2022, down from 5,023 in June, 7,008 in May and 11,583 in April.
Meanwhile, France is the country with the third highest number of cases, with 40.14 million, and Germany is in the number four slot, with 38.5 million total cases.
Brazil, which has recorded the third highest number of deaths as a result of the virus, 705,962, has recorded 37.83 million cases, placing it in the number five slot.
The other five countries with total case figures over the 20 million mark are South Korea, with 34.57 million cases, as number six; Japan, with 33.8 million cases placing it in the number seven slot; and Italy, with 26.13 million, as number eight, as well as the United Kingdom, with 24.72 million, and Russia, with 23.05 million, as nine and ten respectively.
CURRENT U.S. COVID STATISTICS AT A GLANCE
As of September 28, 2023, we are presenting these statistics in a new, more easy-to-read format.
In the United States, in the week ending September 30, 2023, the test positivity rate was – based on data released on October 6 from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention – 10.9%, a figure that is down 1.2% from the previous 7-day period, while the percentage of emergency department visits that were diagnosed as SARS-CoV-2 was 1.6%, a figure that is down 14.5%.
The number of people admitted to hospital in the United States due to SARS-CoV-2 in the same 7-day period was 18,139, a figure that is down 6%. Meanwhile, the percentage of deaths due to SARS-CoV-2 was 2.7%, a figure that is up 3,.8% over the same period.
VACCINATION SPOTLIGHT
Some 70.5% of the world population has received at least one dose of coronavirus vaccine by Saturday, according to Our World in Data, an online scientific publication that tracks such information. So far, 13.51 billion doses of the vaccine have been administered on a global basis and 14,168 doses are now administered each day.
Meanwhile, only 32.6% of people in low-income countries have received one dose, while in countries such as Canada, China, Denmark, France, Italy, the United Kingdom, and the United States, at least 75% of the population has received at least one dose of vaccine.
Only a handful of the world’s poorest countries – Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia and Nepal – have reached the 70% mark in vaccinations. Many countries, however, are under 20% and, in countries such as Haiti, Senegal, and Tanzania, for example, vaccination rates remain at or below 10%.
In addition, with the beginning of vaccinations in North Korea in late September, Eritrea remains the only country in the world that has not administered vaccines in any significant number.
Anna Breuer contributed reporting to this story.
(Photo: Accura Media Group)
All Rights Reserved Travel