Category Archives: Science

UK regulator approves ‘first of its kind’ Covid antibody treatment

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Sajid Javid says green light for Ronapreve – which was used to treat Donald Trump – is ‘fantastic news’

The antibody cocktail used to treat Donald Trump for Covid has been approved by the UK’s medicines regulator, becoming the first treatment in Britain using artificial antibodies to tackle the virus.

The drug, developed by the US biotech company Regeneron, has received the backing of the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA). Clinical trials showed it helped to prevent Covid infection as well as to reduce the risk of hospitalisation or symptoms in severe cases, when given soon after exposure.

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‘No one wanted to read’ his book on pandemic psychology – then Covid hit

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Australian psychologist Steven Taylor published what would turn out to be a prophetic book, and it has become like a Lonely Planet guide to the pandemic

In October 2019, a month or so before Covid-19 began to spread from the industrial Chinese city of Wuhan, Steven Taylor, an Australian psychologist at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, published what would turn out to be a remarkably prophetic book, The Psychology of Pandemics.

Even his publishers had doubts about its relevance and market potential. But in the 22 months since the book has become like a Lonely Planet guide to the pandemic, passed around and marked up like waypoints along a new and dreadful global health journey.

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Born to be wild: India’s first captive-bred endangered vultures are set free

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Numbers of the country’s carrion-loving birds dropped by over 97% in the 1990s. Now, a successful breeding scheme is giving them a boost

In February, the doors of an aviary in West Bengal’s Buxa tiger reserve were flung open. Eight critically endangered captive-bred white-rumped vultures cautiously emerged and within minutes were mingling with wild vultures, devouring the meat of carcasses left out by a team of researchers from the Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS).

The birds were raised in a nearby breeding centre by BNHS, led by assistant director Sachin Ranade, as part of efforts to save India’s Gyps vultures. Gradually, some of the released vultures perched on trees with their wild cousins, while others returned to the wire-mesh aviary where they had spent the previous few months getting acclimatised to their surroundings.

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‘Green steel’: Swedish company ships first batch made without using coal

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Hybrit sends steel made with hydrogen production process to Volvo, which plans to use it in prototype vehicles and components

The world’s first customer delivery of “green steel” produced without using coal is taking place in Sweden, according to its manufacturer.

The Swedish venture Hybrit said it was delivering the steel to truck-maker Volvo AB as a trial run before full commercial production in 2026. Volvo has said it will start production in 2021 of prototype vehicles and components from the green steel.

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Dementia risk lower for people in stimulating jobs, research suggests

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Findings of large study support the idea mental stimulation could delay onset of symptoms, says lead author

People with mentally stimulating jobs have a lower risk of dementia in later years than those who have non-stimulating work, research has suggested.

Scientists looked at more than 100,000 participants across studies from the UK, Europe and the US focused on links between work-related factors and chronic disease, disability and mortality.

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Jabbed adults infected with Delta ‘can match virus levels of unvaccinated’

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Researchers say implications for transmission remain unclear but reaching herd immunity even more challenging

Fully vaccinated adults can harbour virus levels as high as unvaccinated people if infected with the Delta variant, according to a sweeping analysis of UK data, which supports the idea that hitting the threshold for herd immunity is unlikely.

There is abundant evidence that Covid vaccines in the UK continue to offer significant protection against hospitalisations and death. But this new analysis shows that although being fully vaccinated means the risk of getting infected is lower, once infected by Delta a person can carry similar virus levels as unvaccinated people.

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WHO condemns rush by wealthy nations to give Covid vaccine booster

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Move likened to handing out life jackets to those who already have them while letting others drown

The World Health Organization has condemned the rush by wealthy countries to provide Covid-19 vaccine booster shots, while millions of people around the world have yet to receive a single dose.

Speaking before US authorities announced all vaccinated Americans would soon be eligible to receive booster doses, WHO experts insisted there was not enough scientific evidence to support the additional shot.

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Human remains in tomb are best-preserved ever found in Pompeii

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Former slave who rose through the social ranks was interred at necropolis of Porta Sarno before AD79

The partially mummified remains, including hair and bones, of a former slave who rose through the social ranks have been found in the ancient Roman city of Pompeii.

The remains of Marcus Venerius Secundio were found in a tomb at the necropolis of Porta Sarno, which was one of the main entrance gates into the city. The tomb is believed to date back to the decades before Pompeii was destroyed by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD79.

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New mathematical record: what’s the point of calculating pi?

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The famous number has many practical uses, mathematicians say, but is it really worth the time and effort to work out its trillions of digits?

Swiss researchers have spent 108 days calculating pi to a new record accuracy of 62.8tn digits.

Using a computer, their approximation beat the previous world record of 50tn decimal places, and was calculated 3.5 times as quickly. It’s an impressive and time-consuming feat that begs the question: why?

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Swiss researchers calculate pi to new record of 62.8tn figures

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Supercomputer calculation took 108 days and nine hours – 3.5 times as fast as previous record

Swiss researchers have calculated the mathematical constant pi to a new world-record level of exactitude, hitting 62.8tn figures using a supercomputer.

“The calculation took 108 days and nine hours,” the Graubuenden University of Applied Sciences said in a statement.

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Cooling consumerism could save the climate | Letters

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Bill Kingdom says the battle against Covid provides lessons in how to cut consumption to ease global warming. Plus letters from Sue Dalley, David Hughes and Dave Hunter

In Adam Tooze’s article (By pushing for more oil production, the US is killing its climate pledges, 13 August), he surmised that economic activity and fossil fuel consumption are hardwired together. It may be more that economic activity and energy consumption are hardwired together – and thus the need to move to renewables or low-carbon energy sources. That must be part of the strategy, along with as yet unavailable technical solutions such as carbon capture.

However, we seem to tiptoe around the consumption part of any strategy. Lower consumption results in lower carbon emissions. The government has managed to exert strong influence over personal actions during the Covid pandemic using a myriad of three-word slogans. We need a similar push linked to consumption and climate change.
Bill Kingdom
Oxford

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‘Hidden pandemic’: Peruvian children in crisis as carers die

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With 93,000 children in Peru losing a parent to Covid, many face depression, anxiety and poverty

When Covid-19 began shutting down Nilda López’s vital organs, doctors decided that the best chance of saving her and her unborn baby was to put her into a coma.

Six months pregnant, López feared she would not wake up, or that if she did, her baby would not be there.

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Vaccine hesitancy is a symptom of people’s broken relationship with the state | Nesrine Malik

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From Khartoum to Kansas, vaccine conspiracy theorists share one thing in common: they have lost their faith in government

It’s hard to explain what it feels like when someone you thought you knew intimately starts to repeat conspiracy theories about the pandemic and vaccines. You don’t really grasp what’s happening immediately: it’s too vast and jarring a realisation to gulp down in one go. So you go through phases. First you clutch at straws. Perhaps it’s a bad joke, or they didn’t really mean it, or they’re just misinformed. Then you enter a stage of hot, disorienting rage and frustrated remonstration. Once that is spent, finally you cool off. But inside you is a leaden realisation that not only is this person you love putting their life at risk: perhaps you never really knew them at all.

People with the wildest theories about the pandemic can be found in countries even where most people don’t have access to the internet, cable TV or the shock jocks of commercial radio. A common impulse is to write off those espousing conspiracies, consigning them to the casualties claimed by WhatsApp groups, disinformation or silent mental health issues. These things may be true – but vaccine hesitancy is a symptom of broader failures. What all people wary of vaccines have in common, from Khartoum to Kansas, is their trust in the state has been eroded. Without understanding this, we will be fated to keep channelling our frustrations towards individuals without grasping why they have lost trust in the first place.

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Covid news: all 16- and 17-year-olds in England to be offered first jab by 23 August – as it happened

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UK department of health says the date will give teenagers change to build up immunity before school starts

We’re wrapping up the Covid live blog for today, here’s a quick summary of the latest developments:

France’s pass sanitaire health permit system will be extended to more than 120 major department stores and shopping centres on Monday in areas where levels of Covid infection are causing concern, including Paris and the Mediterranean coast.

The decision to extend the measure restricting entry to customers who can prove they have been vaccinated, have had a negative Covid test or have recovered from coronavirus was made by local officials.

The pass will now be required for shoppers entering Paris department stores such as Galeries Lafayette, Printemps, BHV, Le Mon Marché and La Samaritaine, and others mainly in the south of the country.

Related: French Covid permit scheme extended to Paris department stores

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Interoception: the hidden sense that shapes wellbeing

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There’s growing evidence that signals sent from our internal organs to the brain play a major role in regulating emotions and fending off anxiety and depression

If you’re sitting in a safe and comfortable position, close your eyes and try to feel your heart beating in your chest. Can you, without moving your hands to take your pulse, feel each movement and count its rhythm? Or do you struggle to detect anything at all? This simple test is just one way to assess your “interoception” – your brain’s perception of your body’s state, transmitted from receptors on all your internal organs.

Interoception may be less well known than the “outward facing” senses such as sight, hearing, taste, touch and smell, but it has enormous consequences for your wellbeing. Scientists have shown that our sensitivity to interoceptive signals can determine our capacity to regulate our emotions, and our subsequent susceptibility to mental health problems such as anxiety and depression.

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New Covid variants ‘will set us back a year’, experts warn UK government

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Vaccine-beating variant is ‘realistic possibility’, say scientists, amid calls for contingency plans to be revealed

Ministers are being pressed to reveal what contingency plans are in place to deal with a future Covid variant that evades current vaccines, amid warnings from scientific advisers that such an outcome could set the battle against the pandemic back a year or more.

Recent papers produced by the government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) have suggested that the arrival of a variant that evades vaccines is a “realistic possibility”. Sage backed continued work on new vaccines that reduce infection and transmission more than current jabs, the creation of more vaccine-production facilities in the UK and lab-based studies to predict evolution of variants.

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Australia Covid live news update: NSW put in statewide lockdown as AMA says health system ‘can no longer manage’

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NSW premier Gladys Berejiklian announces 466 cases, four deaths and 5km limit for greater Sydney

That’s where I’ll leave you for tonight. It’s been a big day. Let’s recap what we learned.

No public holidays for Parkes...

While the new PHO isn’t available, interesting to note that the Govt took no time at all to cancel the public holidays impacted by the lockdown… ‍♂️ pic.twitter.com/5uEtFIpKiE

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NSW Covid update: entire state in lockdown as premier warns ‘this is literally a war’

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Australian Medical Association says NSW health system ‘can no longer manage’ after record Delta case numbers

New South Wales has been forced into a snap statewide lockdown after enduring its worst day of the Covid-19 pandemic so far, with 466 new cases and four deaths.

Australia’s most populous state has tightened restrictions and imposed new $5,000 fines for lockdown breaches, ahead of an expected worsening of numbers in coming days.

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