The Evening Report
Dreaded P1 variant arrives in Denmark
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Denmark’s Health Minister Magnus Heunicke tweeted today that the first Brazilian P1 COVID variant infection has been confirmed in the country.
The Staten Serum Institut says the P1 infection case was found on Sjælland. It adds “there is a strong suspicion that this variant has increased infectivity, but this has not been conclusively proven.” It says vaccines already in use Denmark are “expected to work” against it but “Impaired effects may occur.”
The SSI has also updated its report on corona variants. It finds the U.K. variant now exceeds 70% of all positive test results as of last week.
They have also published a chart comparing the UK variant infections versus the original corona strain by age of the infected.
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Denmark’s Finance Minister Nicolai Wammen has told TV2 that a digital COVID passport will be ready for Danes by May.
The digital passport, an app on your phone, will have information about your vaccination status that can be easily scanned. If not yet vaccinated, it will show your latest COVID test results.
Once up and running it would allow access for people to attend cultural events, go to restaurants, and travel as society fully reopens again.
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Denmark is reporting 574 COVID infections and three more coronavirus deaths in the last day.
164,172 corona tests administered yesterday equals a positivity percentage of 0.35%.
COVID hospitalizations (225) are down (-7), ICU numbers (34) also dropped (-5), and ventilator numbers (19) also down (-1).
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On the vaccination front, 466,430 1st dose vaccinations (8% of population) have been administered while 187,020 people (3.2% of population) are now fully vaccinated against the coronavirus.
The Staten Serum Institut has updated its vaccine delivery schedule.
Weekly Pfizer shipments will rise to 87,750 doses per week as of week ten. In weeks 12 and 13 over 100,000 AstraZeneca vaccine doses will begin to arrive each week, which should seriously bolster Denmark’s vaccination effort. Shipments from Moderna remain spotty.
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The Danish Medicines Agency debuted on TikTok today as it seeks to spread its messaging on COVID vaccine safety to more people, especially the younger crowd.
The agency is charged with monitoring and reporting on vaccine side effects.
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Sweden’s infection curve is marching upward again as it added 6,179 infections and suffered 82 more corona deaths since yesterday’s update.
To date 539,387 1st dose (6.6% of population) and 278,319 2nd dose (3.4% of population) vaccinations have been administered. #Sverige
Radio Sweden is reporting that the number of COVID infections in Stockholm has doubled in the last three weeks. Infections tripled in Region Västerbotten over the same period. Swedish hospitals are now seeing an influx of much younger people infected with the coronavirus.
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Finland has recorded 797 new infections and four more virus deaths since yesterday’s update.
On March 1st, the U.K. variant driven infections surge pushed infections to 778, the highest of any day in the pandemic to date.
Finland Prime Minister Sanna Marin says her government is getting ready to invoke the Emergency Powers Act.
“We’re now preparing the decrees we have to submit to the Parliament and we’ll be using several clauses of the emergency powers act because we think it’s warranted and necessary.”
COVID hospitalizations (221) are up (+13), while ICU numbers (37) are down (-2).
To date there have been 404,210 1st dose vaccinations (7.3% of population). 83,100 people (1.5% of population) are now fully vaccinated.
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Norway has added 627 infections and nine more corona deaths.
COVID hospitalizations (105) are down (-5) Ventilator numbers (22) are unchanged.
To date 344,669 1st doses (6.42% of population) and 166,322 2nd vaccine doses (3.1% of population) have been administered.
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The European Medicines Agency has issued guidelines for vaccine modifications to address corona variants. Already approved ‘parent’ vaccines will require smaller clinical trials and studies of one shot boosters. Any formula tweaks won’t require laboratory studies.
Basically, in an effort to streamline the approval process to address variants, small changes to existing vaccine formulas will have an expedited approval stream. If the vaccine undergoes large or wholesale changes, it must go through the regulatory process from scratch.
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More alarm bells in Europe as Italy, the Czech Republic, Poland, and Romania have so far reported very elevated numbers today. Some are reporting infection numbers not seen in months.
More on this in the morning when numbers are finalized.
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Mabion, a Polish biotech company, has signed a preliminary agreement to manufacture the Novavac corona vaccine. The company is headquartered in the U.S. and its vaccine has shown an efficacy of 86% in clinical trials. It has not been approved for use anywhere yet.
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The United Kingdom registered 6,385 new infections and 315 virus deaths today
The Rate of positive results, fatalities, and hospitalizations continue to trend down.
To date, 20,703,615 1st vaccine doses and 895,412 2nd doses have been administered.
Public Health England has updated its list of confirmed corona variants today.
Most notable is B.1.1.7 with the E484K mutation. That is the much more contagious U.K. variant that has developed the ‘escape’ mutation allowing the virus to slip by the body’s defenses.
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In Canada there were 2,714 new infections and another 28 corona deaths yesterday. Infection declines may have hit the bottom of the trough between infection waves.
To date 1,470,034 1st dose vaccinations (3.87% of pop) have been administered. 544,094 Canadians are now fully vaccinated against the coronavirus.
Canada will receive 944,600 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine. However, there is a vaccination time crunch. The doses are due to expire in early April. This puts pressure on the vaccination effort to get those doses into arms before they go bad.
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Ontario’s Health Minister Christine Elliott staten toddy that “Ontario is reporting 958 cases of COVID-19 and over 52,600 tests completed. Locally, there are 249 new cases in Toronto, 164 in Peel and 92 in York Region. As of 8:00 p.m. yesterday, 754,419 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been administered.”
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In Quebec there were 729 new infections and another 19 deaths. 618 people are in hospital, with 120 in an ICU.
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In Atlantic Canada, Newfoundland and Labrador registered three new infections. New Brunswick has four new infections while Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia had one each.
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Manitoba reported 64 new infections and another eight corona deaths. The province is beginning to ease restrictions.
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There were 134 infections and two more virus deaths in Saskatchewan.
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Alberta registered 257 new infections and two additional deaths yesterday. Hospitalizations stood at 261 with 54 people in an ICU.
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B.C. logged another 438 infections and added two more corona deaths.
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India’s Bharat Biotech’s COVID vaccine has shown to have an efficacy of 81% in late stage clinical trials. 43 infections were recorded in the test group of 25,800 participants. Among those, 36 infections were in the placebo group and seven among those that had been vaccinated.