Category Archives: Infectious Diseases

Hackers ‘try to steal Covid vaccine secrets in intellectual property war’

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Agencies point finger at state-sponsored hackers from China, Russia, Iran and North Korea

State-sponsored hackers from China, Russia, Iran and North Korea are engaged in concerted attempts to steal coronavirus vaccine secrets in what security experts describe as “an intellectual property war”.

They accuse hostile-state hackers of trying to obtain trial results early and seize sensitive information about mass production of drugs, at a time when a range of vaccines are close to being approved for the public.

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Which countries and hackers are targeting Covid vaccine developers?

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The states and their hackers that security experts believe are targeting vaccine developers

Russia’s best-known hacker groups – Fancy Bear and Cozy Bear – are considered to be linked to the country’s intelligence organisations, according to western security agencies.

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Why the race to find Covid-19 vaccines is far from over

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Despite the promising news from Pfizer and Moderna, other efforts – which may be even more effective – continue around the world

While everyone celebrated this month’s news that not one but two experimental vaccines against Covid-19 have proved at least 90% effective at preventing disease in late-stage clinical trials, research into understanding how the Sars-CoV-2 virus, which causes Covid-19, interacts with the human immune system never paused.

There are plenty of questions still to answer about the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines: how well will they protect the elderly, for example, and how long for? Which aspects of the immune response that they elicit are protective and which aren’t? Can even better results be achieved, with vaccines that target different parts of the immune system?

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Coronavirus live: UK lab-confirmed cases pass 1.5m; Gaza’s clinics could soon be overwhelmed

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Infections up in UK by more than 18,000 on Sunday; warning over Gaza Strip infections; G20 leaders agree to fund fair distribution of vaccines

Experts have urged Americans against travelling for family gatherings at Thanksgiving this week even though millions were set to defy the advice, as the US crossed the threshold of more than 12m cases of coronavirus.

Ominous warnings came as Donald Trump appeared to admit that coronavirus is “running wild” across the US, in contrast with his statements throughout the election campaign that the virus would simply “go away” or “disappear” and, more recently, that the country was “rounding the turn” on the pandemic.

Related: Millions of Americans set to ignore warnings against Thanksgiving travel

The Palestinian health ministry has recommended strict limits on Christmas celebrations in Bethlehem this year due to the coronavirus outbreak.

Celebrations in the biblical town revered by Christians as Jesus’ birthplace are usually attended by thousands of people from around the world, but this year the ministry has recommended the upcoming tree lighting ceremony in Manger Square be limited to 50 people, throughout the festive season.

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Donald Trump appears to admit Covid is ‘running wild’ in the US

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President’s tweet came as FDA approved emergency use authorisation for Regeneron antibody therapy

Donald Trump appears to have admitted that coronavirus is “running wild” across the US, in contrast with his statements throughout the election campaign that the country was “rounding the turn” on the pandemic.

As new Covid infections in the US approached 200,000 a day, Trump took to Twitter on Saturday night to insist things were bad outside the United States as well: “The Fake News is not talking about the fact that ‘Covid’ is running wild all over the World, not just in the U.S.”

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Human rights must not be ‘trampled’ in global rush for PPE, say MPs

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Calls come after Guardian finds UK sourced PPE from factories in China where North Koreans work in modern slavery

MPs and experts in the procurement of personal protective equipment have said human rights must not be “trampled” in the rush to secure PPE for frontline workers via global supply chains.

The calls come after a Guardian investigation found evidence that the British government had sourced PPE from factories in China where hundreds of North Korean women have been secretly working in conditions of modern slavery.

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Coronavirus detected in Victorian sewage as state records 22 days with no new cases

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NSW records 10 cases in hotel quarantine, while Queensland announces two and Western Australia one

Victoria has only one active Covid-19 case but authorities are concerned about traces of the virus unexpectedly found at a Melbourne wastewater facility.

Victoria has gone 22 days with no new coronavirus cases while on Saturday New South Wales recorded 10 new cases in hotel quarantine. Queensland announced two new coronavirus cases and Western Australia one – all of which were in hotel quarantine.

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Coronavirus live news: Brazil passes 6m cases as South Australia reports new case

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Donald Trump Jr tests positive for Covid; South Australia makes pizza worker scapegoat for failures; German doctor arrested on suspicion of killing two Covid patients. Follow latest updates

via Reuters

Mexico’s confirmed coronavirus death toll has risen to 100,823, according the the country’s health ministry.

In case you missed it earlier:

In Australia, New South Wales has reached two weeks – one complete infection cycle – without a single locally transmitted coronavirus case, AAP reports.

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Coronavirus live news: UK records 341 more deaths; Russia reports record new cases and deaths

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Donald Trump Jr tests positive for Covid; South Australia lockdown to end at midnight on Saturday; global cases pass 57.5m. Follow latest updates

The number of Covid-19 cases in the United States was on track to surpass 12 million on Saturday, just days ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday that health experts have warned could fuel the surging spread of infection around the country.

The milestone marks a worsening of the country’s Covid-19 epidemic, which has claimed a quarter of a million lives across America, more than in any other nation.

Turkey on Saturday reported its highest daily number of new coronavirus patients since the outbreak started.

Figures from the health ministry showed that 5,532 people had been diagnosed with Covid-19 symptoms in the previous 24 hours.

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Wealthy nations urged to give portion of Covid vaccine as ‘humanitarian buffer’

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Stockpile sought for use in rebel-held territories, asylum camps and for others unlikely to receive vaccinations

Public health groups are lobbying countries to commit a portion of their Covid-19 vaccine supplies to a “humanitarian buffer” that would be used to inoculate people living in rebel-held territories, those in asylum-seeker camps and others unlikely to receive vaccinations from their governments.

The emergency stockpile is intended to act as a safety net to ensure the global effort to end the Covid-19 pandemic is not sabotaged by governments using vaccines as bargaining chip with restive populations, or simply denying it to some marginalised groups.

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Scientists race to find ‘warm’ Covid vaccine to solve issue of cold storage

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With potential injectable vaccines estimated to be out of reach for two-thirds of world’s population, scientists hope to find less-heat-sensitive formulations

News that one of the potential coronavirus vaccines had at least a 90% efficacy rate was a “victory for science”, said K Srinath Reddy, a cardiologist and president of the Public Health Foundation of India. But it meant little to his country’s 1.3 billion citizens.

“For us, the Pfizer vaccine is more of a scientific curiosity than a practical possibility,” Reddy said.

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Mexico deaths pass 100,000 as fragments found in Victorian sewage

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Obrador rejects criticism as political attacks; Canada fears big rise in cases could overwhelm hospitals; Italy records 37,242 new cases

This blog is now closed. Follow our continuing coronavirus coverage here

Marshall is asked if he admits there have been shortcomings in South Australia’s hotel quarantine system.

“Not at all. There will be a thorough investigation but what we have said since day one is this is a highly contagious disease ... we know that, very highly trained nurses and with all of their PPE, they have been able to contract the disease, so we know there is a risk associated with every time we bring somebody into this country,” he says.

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Coronavirus is evolving. Whether it gets deadlier or not may depend on us | Laura Spinney

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There’s now evidence that ignoring social distancing rules could help more lethal strains of Covid-19 to win out

Letting the virus that causes Covid-19 circulate more-or-less freely is dangerous not only because it risks overwhelming hospitals and so endangering lives unnecessarily, but also because it could delay the evolution of the virus to a more benign form and potentially even make it more lethal.

Though the data is still sketchy and the measures crude, this effect may already be influencing the difference in death rates between Sweden – which took a relaxed approach to containment until recently – and Norway, whose measures have been much stricter. Sweden has more than three times as many deaths per 100 cases as its neighbour.

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Coronavirus live news: Russia exceeds 2m cases; Danish mink Covid mutation ‘most likely extinct’

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Russia passes landmark number as 23,610 new cases reported; Denmark says no further cases of mutation since mid-September

The UK will be urged to reconsider its opposition to waiving intellectual property rights for Covid-19 vaccines and treatments at a World Trade Organization meeting on Friday, a move that would allow mass production of treatments and inoculations against the disease and could significantly shorten the length of the pandemic, campaigners say.

India and South Africa have proposed that WTO member states be allowed to waive patents and other intellectual property (IP) rights on any treatments and tools related to Covid-19 until the end of the pandemic, including for the Moderna and Pfizer/BionNTech vaccines that are set to be approved for use in the coming weeks.

Related: UK faces calls to drop opposition to patent-free Covid vaccines

More mink mutation news: a number of cases of Covid-19 have been found in people who work in the mink industry in Sweden.

In a statement the Swedish Public Health Agency said it and “the Swedish Veterinary Institute, the Swedish Board of Agriculture and local infection control units are jointly investigating whether there is any connection between the cases and their contact with minks.”

Flera myndigheter utreder fall av covid-19 inom minknäringen. https://t.co/TRDin3ZZHG

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Covid-19 mink variants discovered in humans in seven countries

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Denmark has already launched a nationwide cull of its farmed mink herd after concerns for vaccine efficacy

Seven countries are now reporting mink-related Sars-CoV-2 mutations in humans, according to new scientific analysis.

The mutations are identified as Covid-19 mink variants as they have repeatedly been found in mink and now in humans as well.

Uncertainty around the implications of the discovery of a Covid-19 mink variant in humans led Denmark, the world’s largest mink fur producer, to launch a nationwide cull earlier this month.

The cull was sparked by research from Denmark’s public health body, the Statens Serum Institut (SSI), which showed that a mink variant called C5 was harder for antibodies to neutralise and posed a potential threat to vaccine efficacy.

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Coronavirus live news: US doctors urge Trump to share Covid data; record cases in Tokyo

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Medical establishment says cooperation can save lives; UK pressed to open transatlantic travel corridors; South Australia locks down for 6 days

I am handing over the blog to my colleague Alexandra Topping in the UK.

Thanks for reading but if you’re just joining, here are the main developments of the past few hours:

Businesses in the Japanese capital, Tokyo, could be asked to shorten their opening hours in order to contain an outbreak of the virus that has seen cases in the city reach a record daily high of 472 on Wednesday.

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Covid: near-lockdown curbs imposed on west of Scotland

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Eleven local authorities to enter level 4 – highest of Scotland’s five-tier system of virus controls

More than 2.7 million Scots will face near-lockdown restrictions for three weeks after Nicola Sturgeon imposed the country’s highest level of Covid restrictions across the west of Scotland.

Following a cabinet meeting on Tuesday morning, Scotland’s first minister told MSPs that 11 local authority areas would enter level 4 – the highest of Scotland’s five-tier system of virus controls – from 6pm this Friday for a limited period.

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Dolly Parton partly funded Moderna Covid vaccine research

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The country music icon’s $1m donation supported the latest breakthrough by Moderna and several research papers

It’s truly the greatest gift of all: a $1m donation by Dolly Parton to coronavirus vaccine research supported the development of the Moderna vaccine, which shows 95% protection from the virus.

In April, Parton donated £800,000 to research after her friend Dr Naji Abumrad of the Vanderbilt Institute for Infection, Immunology and Inflammation at Vanderbilt University in Tennessee told her that they were making “some exciting advancements” in the search for a cure for the virus. Abumrad and Parton became friends in 2014 after the singer was involved in a car accident and treated at Vanderbilt.

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UK, Italy and Spain record highest daily death totals since spring – as it happened

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This blog is closing now but you can follow our continuing live coverage here. Thanks for reading.

Related: Coronavirus live news: senator Chuck Grassley tests positive; airlines offer Covid testing

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Covid: chemicals found in everyday products could hinder vaccine

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Researchers worry PFAS, commonly found in the bodies of Americans, will reduce the immunization’s effectiveness

The successful uptake of any vaccine for Covid-19, a crucial step in returning a sense of normalcy after a year ravaged by the coronavirus pandemic, could be hindered by widespread contamination from a range of chemicals used in everyday products.

Small amounts of per- and polyfluoroalkyl (or PFAS) chemicals are commonly found in the bodies of people in the US, as well as several other countries. These man-made chemicals, used in everything from non-stick pans to waterproof clothes to pizza boxes, have been linked to an elevated risk of liver damage, decreased fertility and even cancer.

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