Tag Archives: United States

AstraZeneca expects COVID vaccine result by year-end if trials resume

By John Miller and Ludwig Burger

ZURICH/FRANKFURT (Reuters) – AstraZeneca should still know by year-end whether its experimental vaccine protects people against coronavirus, as long as it is cleared to resume trials soon, its chief executive said on Thursday amid doubts over its rollout.

Governments desperate to put an end to the COVID-19 pandemic which has caused more than 900,000 deaths and huge economic and social disruption during 2020 are pinning their hopes on a vaccine.

However British drugmaker AstraZeneca suspended late-stage trials on its potential vaccine this week after an illness in a participant in Britain who was reported to be suffering from symptoms associated with transverse myelitis, a rare spinal inflammatory disorder.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has flagged the AstraZeneca vaccine, which is being developed with the University of Oxford, as the most promising for coronavirus.

CEO Pascal Soriot said during an online event on Thursday that AstraZeneca did not yet know the diagnosis of the participant who was ill, adding that it was not clear if the volunteer had transverse myelitis and more tests were needed.

The diagnosis would be submitted to an independent safety committee and this would usually then say whether trials can be resumed, Soriot said, adding it was usual for such pauses.

“It’s very common, actually, and many experts will tell you this,” Soriot said, adding: “The difference with other vaccine trials is, the whole world is not watching them, of course. They stop, they study, and they restart.”

Shares in AstraZeneca fell on Wednesday after the trial halt raised doubts about the timeline for the vaccine’s rollout.

AstraZeneca would supply vaccines to countries at the same time to ensure a fair and equitable distribution, Soriot said, reiterating that the company was close to having capacity to produce 3 billion doses at sites set up around the world to prevent governments from restricting distribution.

With up to 60,000 people set to participate in the study program, AstraZeneca’s CEO said the volume was typical of vaccine trials and large enough to spot rare side effects.

“With this you are going to pick up very rare events.” he said, adding that a planned staggered launch, prioritizing at-risk groups, would provide further assurance for the masses that are set to be covered by government plans at a later stage.

Serum Institute of India, one of AstraZeneca’s development and production partners, said on Thursday it was joining the suspension, backtracking on remarks that it did not face any issues.

‘DIFFICULT TO BE SURE’

Transverse myelitis cases after a vaccination have been documented before, but concrete links between the condition and vaccinations have not been established, experts said.

The U.S.-based Mayo Clinic concludes that the association so far is not strong enough to warrant limiting any vaccine.

A 2009 review in the journal Lupus of nearly 40 years of English-language publications found 37 cases of transverse myelitis associated with hepatitis B vaccines, measles-mumps-rubella, diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis and others.

The vaccines remained on the market, Stephen Evans, a professor of pharmacoepidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said.

Linking such an autoimmune response to a single factor like a vaccine is problematic, he said, given the number of immunological, hormonal or environmental factors at play.

“It’s terribly difficult to be sure,” Evans said.

RBC Capital Markets analyst Bryan Abrahams cautioned the trial participant’s condition must be thoroughly investigated.

“Even a single case could possibly imply a rate or association higher in the study than what is normally observed sporadically” he wrote to investors, adding a one in 10,000 risk, if confirmed, would likely be unacceptable.

BioNTech, among the frontrunners in the vaccine race with partner Pfizer, echoed remarks by Soriot that clinical halts are a common feature of immunization trials.

“Safety is a top priority,” its CEO Ugur Sahin told Reuters.

(Additional reporting by Patricia Weiss and Josephine Mason; Editing by Alexander Smith)

India reports record daily jump of 95,735 coronavirus cases

BENGALURU (Reuters) – India reported record jumps in new coronavirus infections and deaths on Thursday, taking its tally of cases past 4.4 million, health ministry figures showed.

In the last 24 hours, 95,735 new infections were detected, with 1,172 deaths accounting for the highest single-day mortality figures in more than a month, to push the toll beyond 75,000.

Infections are growing faster in India than anywhere else in the world and the United States is the only nation worse affected.

(Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

Severe COVID-19 riskier than heart attack for young adults; antibiotic shows no benefit

By Nancy Lapid

(Reuters) – The following is a roundup of some of the latest scientific studies on the novel coronavirus and efforts to find treatments and vaccines for COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus.

More young adults survive heart attacks than severe COVID-19

Among COVID-19 patients treated at 419 U.S. hospitals from April through June, only about 5% were ages 18 to 34. But that group had “substantial rates of adverse outcomes,” according to a report on Wednesday in JAMA Internal Medicine. Roughly one in five needed intensive care, one in 10 needed mechanical ventilation, and nearly 3% died. While the mortality rate is lower than in older adults, it is roughly double the death rate of young adults from heart attacks, the authors say. Obesity, high blood pressure, and diabetes were tied to higher risk for adverse events. For young adults with more than one of these conditions, the risk of a bad outcome was similar to middle-aged adults without the risk factors. More than half of hospitalized young adults were Black or Hispanic, “consistent with prior findings of disproportionate illness severity in these demographic groups,” the authors said. “Given the sharply rising rates of COVID-19 infection in young adults, these findings underscore the importance of infection prevention measures in this age group,” the concluded.

Antibiotic fails to help hospitalized COVID-19 patients

The antibiotic azithromycin did not appear to provide any benefit to hospitalized COVID-19 patients who were having trouble breathing, according to a study in Brazil. At 57 hospitals, 243 COVID-19 patients who needed oxygen or mechanical ventilation were randomly assigned to receive azithromycin, while 183 similar patients did not get the antibiotic. All received other standard treatment, which in Brazil included hydroxychloroquine, a malaria drug that other studies have shown provides little or no benefit. While azithromycin did not appear to do any harm, after 15 days it was not associated with any patient improvement nor did it reduce their risk of death. In an April survey of more than 6,000 physicians in 30 countries, azithromycin was the second most commonly prescribed treatment for COVID-19, the study investigators wrote in The Lancet medical journal. The absence of any benefit in this new study “suggests that the routine use of this strategy should be avoided,” they said.

Risk of catching COVID-19 while hospitalized can be low

Among nearly 8,500 patients admitted to a large Boston hospital between early March and the end of May, only two became sick with coronavirus infections that may have been acquired while they were hospitalized, doctors report. One likely was infected by a spouse who initially appeared well during daily visits but who developed symptoms while the patient was still hospitalized. That was before visitor restrictions and universal masking rules had been implemented. The other patient developed symptoms four days after leaving the hospital. The source of the infection is not known. According to a paper published on Wednesday in JAMA Network Open, infection control efforts at the hospital included dedicated COVID-19 units with airborne infection isolation rooms, personal protective equipment for staff and monitoring to make sure those were used correctly, universal masking, visitor restriction, and liberal COVID-19 testing of symptomatic and asymptomatic patients. These “robust and rigorous infection control practices may be associated with minimized risk” of COVID-19 spreading through hospitals, the authors conclude. Their findings, if replicated at other U.S. hospitals, “should provide reassurance to patients,” they said.

Longer-term COVID-19 lung damage can improve over time

COVID-19 lung damage persists long term but tends to improve, researchers reported on Monday at the European Respiratory Society International Virtual Congress. Researchers studied 86 hospitalized COVID-19 patients, 48% of whom had a smoking history and 21% of whom required intensive care. At 6 weeks after discharge, 47% of patients still reported feeling short of breath. By 12 weeks, that dropped to 39%. CT scans still showed lung damage in 88% of patients at six weeks, dropping to 56% at 12 weeks. “Overall, this study shows that COVID-19 survivors have persisting pulmonary impairment weeks after recovery. Yet, overtime, a moderate improvement is detectable,” lead researcher Dr. Sabina Sahanic, from University Clinic of Internal Medicine in Innsbruck, Austria, said during a press briefing. A related study featured at the meeting stressed the importance of early pulmonary rehabilitation after COVID-19 patients come off a ventilator. This should include balance and walking, muscle strengthening, respiratory exercises and endurance training. “The sooner rehabilitation started and the longer it lasted, the faster and better was the improvement in patients’ walking and breathing capacities and muscle gain,” coauthor Yara Al Chikhanie, from Grenoble Alps University in France, said in a statement.

(Reporting by Nancy Lapid; Editing by Bill Berkrot)

U.S., Oman discuss ways to strengthen security, boost economic ties

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday spoke with Oman’s leader, Sultan Haitham bin Tariq al-Said, about ways to enhance regional security and strengthen economic ties between the two countries, the White House said in a statement.

Trump thanked the Omani leader for his statements of support following a U.S.-brokered agreement by the United Arab Emirates and Israel to normalize relations, the White House said.

“President Trump highlighted the importance of the United States-brokered Abraham Accords announced on August 13th and thanked the Sultan for Oman’s comments in support of the Israel-United Arab Emirates deal,” the statement said.

Oman has been mentioned by Israeli officials as another country that could follow the UAE lead in normalizing ties with Israel, but there was no mention of that in the White House statement.

White House adviser Jared Kushner last week said he hoped another Arab country would normalize ties with Israel within months.

Israel’s neighbors Egypt and Jordan reached peace deals with it decades ago, but other Arab states have long held the position that Israel must agree to give more land to the Palestinians for a state before ties can be normalized.

The United States and Oman have a free trade agreement that entered into force in 2009. Trade in goods and services between the two countries totaled an estimated $4.4 billion in 2018, according to the U.S. Trade Representative’s office.

(Reporting by Andrea Shalal; Editing by Tom Brown)

Two killed as violence spills from Mexico protest against water flow to U.S.

By Jose Luis Gonzalez

LA BOQUILLA DAM, Mexico (Reuters) – Two people died in a gunfight with Mexico’s military police near a protest at a dam that diverts water to the United States, the National Guard said on Wednesday, as tensions rose between protesters and officials in the drought-hit region.

Mexicans in the northern border state of Chihuahua, angry at the water being funneled across the border, on Tuesday evening hurled Molotov cocktails and rocks at security troops, eventually occupying the La Boquilla dam and closing the sluice gates.

The violence, which Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador called “regrettable,” comes amid plans to divert additional water to the United States due to the so-called ‘water debt’ Mexico has accumulated as part of a 1944 bilateral treaty that regulates water sharing between the neighbors.

The National Guard said on Twitter that some of its agents from La Boquilla on Tuesday night detained three people found with tear gas and a firearm ammunition magazine, and took them for processing to the city of Delicias.

There, the National Guard unit was shot at and “repelled the aggression,” according to the statement. One person died at the scene and another from their injuries later in hospital, it said.

Chihuahua Attorney General Cesar Peniche told reporters that investigators called to the scene found a car hit by at least three bullets. Inside the vehicle, a woman had been killed by gunfire while a man was injured. Local police told investigators that the National Guard had left the scene shortly before, Peniche said.

News channel Milenio named the two killed as Jessica Silva and Jaime Torres, a couple who worked in agriculture and who had protested at La Boquilla.

A Reuters witness said groups of residents in towns surrounding the La Boquilla dam clashed with National Guard troops earlier on Tuesday after they refused to turn off the dam floodgates.

The residents lobbed Molotov cocktails, rocks and sticks at the security forces, who were clad in riot gear and retaliated with tear gas, the witness said and images show. Eventually, the protesters stormed the dam premises and shut the floodgates themselves.

When asked about the situation at his regular news conference on Wednesday, Lopez Obrador said the National Guard had been “prudent” to withdraw to avoid inflaming tensions.

He did not mention the deaths, which the National Guard reported on Twitter after the briefing.

Lopez Obrador has sought to assuage concerns of Mexican farmers and voters about water rights, while protecting delicate relations with the United States.

He has also warned that Mexico could face sanctions if it did not divert water, after building up a deficit in recent years by receiving more water than it has given back.

(Additional reporting and writing by Drazen Jorgic and Daina Beth Solomon, Editing by Rosalba O’Brien)

U.S. regulator calls climate change a systemic risk

(Reuters) – Climate change poses a “slow motion” systemic threat to the stability of the U.S. financial system requiring urgent action from financial regulators, including the Federal Reserve and the Securities Exchange Commission.

That is one of the findings of a landmark report commissioned by the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission and put together by a panel convened about 10 months ago by Rostin Behnam, one of two Democrats on the five-member CFTC.

The panel’s 35 members, including representatives of Goldman Sachs Group Inc., the Dairy Farmers of America, and The Nature Conservancy among others, approved the report on Tuesday.

“The physical impacts of climate change are already affecting the United States, and … the transition to net-zero emissions may also impact many segments of the economy,” the 196-page report said.

“Both physical and transition risks could give rise to systemic and sub-systemic financial shocks, potentially causing unprecedented disruption in the proper functioning of financial markets and institutions.”

A sudden shift in perceptions of the risks from frequent wildfires and intense hurricanes could bring a sudden drop in asset prices, for instance, that cascades through a community and spill more broadly into markets, the report said.

And because the COVID-19 pandemic has depleted household wealth, government budgets and business balance sheets, the economy is more vulnerable than before, it added, “increasing the probability of an overall shock with systemic implications.”

The report’s release comes less than two months ahead of a national election that pits Republican President Donald Trump, who says climate change is a hoax, against Democratic challenger Joe Biden, who calls climate change an “existential threat.”

Its first recommendation is to “establish a price on carbon” that is hefty enough to push businesses and markets to cut use of carbon dioxide-producing fuels such as oil and gas. Taxing carbon would require action by Congress.

But the report’s dozens of other recommendations amount to a call for a sweeping rewrite of financial market rules and norms that could go forward without any new laws and no matter who wins the presidency.

Among the proposals: requiring banks to address climate-related financial risks and listed companies to disclose emissions, and to stress test community banks for their resilience to climate change.

Regulators in Europe have worked for years on efforts to calibrate and mitigate climate risks to financial markets.

Regulators in the United States, where politicians regularly cast doubt on the fact that burning fossil fuels is affecting the earth’s climate, have lagged far behind on such work.

Only recently has the Federal Reserve begun to acknowledge the potential for climate change to destabilize the financial system, and to think about possible responses.

The report urges financial authorities to integrate climate risk “into their balance sheet management and asset purchases, particularly relating to corporate and municipal debt.”

It also calls for them to do research into the financial implications of climate change and join international climate-focused groups, such as the Network for Greening the Financial System, all of which appear to specifically apply to the Fed.

(Reporting by Ann Saphir in Berkeley, Calif.; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

U.S. COVID-19 deaths surpass 190,000; Iowa and South Dakota emerge as new hotspots

By Anurag Maan

(Reuters) – Coronavirus deaths in the United States topped 190,000 on Wednesday along with a spike in new cases in the U.S. Midwest with states like Iowa and South Dakota emerging as the new hotspots in the past few weeks.

Iowa currently has one of the highest rates of infection in the nation, with 15% of tests last week coming back positive. Nearby South Dakota has a positive test rate of 19% and North Dakota is at 18%, according to a Reuters analysis.

The surge in Iowa and South Dakota is being linked to colleges reopening in Iowa and an annual motorcycle rally last month in Sturgis, South Dakota.

Kansas, Idaho and Missouri are also among the top 10 states for positive test rates.

New coronavirus infections have fallen for seven weeks in a row for the United States with a death rate of about 6,100 per week from COVID-19 in the last month.

On a per capita basis, the United States ranks 12th in the world for the number of deaths, with 58 deaths per 100,000 people, and 11th in the world for cases, with 1,933 cases per 100,000 residents, according to a Reuters analysis.

U.S. confirmed cases are highest in the world with now over 6.3 million followed by India with 4.4 million cases and Brazil with 4.2 million. The U.S. death toll is also the highest in the world.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention had forecast last month that the U.S. death toll will reach 200,000 to 211,000 by Sept. 26.

The University of Washington’s health institute last week forecasted that the U.S. deaths from the coronavirus will reach 410,000 by the end of the year.

(Reporting by Anurag Maan in Bengaluru; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)

United States formally announces troop reduction in Iraq

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The United States military on Wednesday announced that it would be reducing its presence in Iraq from 5,200 to 3,000 troops this month, formalizing a move that had been long expected.

Last month, Reuters reported that the United States was expected to reduce its troops presence in Iraq by about a third.

The United States has around 5,200 troops that were deployed in Iraq to fight the Islamic State militant group. Officials in the U.S.-led coalition say Iraqi forces are now mostly able to handle the remnants of Islamic State on their own.

“We are continuing to expand on our partner capacity programs that enable Iraqi forces and allow us to reduce our footprint in Iraq,” Marine General Frank McKenzie, the head of U.S. Central Command, said during a visit to Iraq.

A senior administration official had said on Tuesday that President Donald Trump would be announcing a reduction of U.S. troops from Iraq.

The United States and Iraq in June affirmed their commitment to the reduction of U.S. troops in the country in coming months, with no plans by Washington to maintain permanent bases or a permanent military presence.

In 2016 Trump campaigned on ending America’s “endless wars,” but U.S. troops remain in countries like Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria, albeit in smaller numbers.

Last month during a meeting with the Iraqi prime minister, Trump redoubled his promise to withdraw the U.S. troops still in Iraq.

Trump’s meeting with the Iraqi leader came amid a new spike in tensions between Washington and Tehran after Washington said it would seek to reinstate all previously suspended U.S. sanctions on Iran at the United Nations.

Iraq’s parliament had voted earlier this year for the departure of foreign troops from Iraq, and United States and other coalition troops have been leaving as part of a drawdown.

(Reporting by Idrees Ali; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)

Trump to host Israel-United Arab Emirates deal-signing ceremony on Sept 15

By Steve Holland

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump will hold a Sept. 15 signing ceremony for a groundbreaking Middle East agreement normalizing relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, a senior White House official said on Tuesday.

As part of the deal, announced at the White House on Aug. 13 following what officials said were 18 months of talks, the Gulf state agreed to normal relations with Israel, while Israel agreed to continue with plans to suspend its annexation of the West Bank.

The senior White House official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and UAE Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed al-Nahyan would lead the two delegations to the ceremony.

“I am proud to embark next week to Washington, at the invitation of President Trump, to take part in the this historic ceremony at the White House for the foundation of the peace treaty between Israel and the United (Arab) Emirates,” Netanyahu wrote on Twitter.

Trump and other administration officials have said they expect Saudi Arabia and other countries to follow suit in recognizing Israel.

Trump senior adviser Jared Kushner and other top administration officials accompanied an Israeli delegation last week on the first flight from Israel to the United Arab Emirates to celebrate the agreement.

Iran has dismissed the agreement, which also served to firm up opposition to Tehran, a regional power seen by the UAE, Israel and the United States as the main threat in the Middle East.

The deal falls short of any grand Middle East peace plan to resolve decades of conflict between Israel and the Palestinians despite Trump’s pledge to do so.

The White House hope is that more such deals between Israel and the Gulf states will emerge, prompting the Palestinians to join negotiations.

Trump proposed a peace plan in January that heavily favored the Israelis, but it has not advanced in any significant way.

The Palestinian leadership initially called the accord “betrayal” and a “stab in the back of the Palestinian cause,” but has curbed its criticism, according to a draft resolution ahead of an Arab League meeting in Cairo on Wednesday.

The draft, seen by Reuters, does not include a call to condemn, or act against, the Emirates over the U.S.-brokered deal.

The United Arab Emirates is planning to make its first official visit to Israel on Sept. 22, a source familiar with the provisional itinerary said on Monday.

(Reporting by Steve Holland, additional reporting by Dan Williams in Jerusalem; Editing by Franklin Paul and Howard Goller)

U.S. CDC reports 188,688 deaths from coronavirus

(Reuters) – The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said on Tuesday the number of deaths due to the new coronavirus had risen by 175 to 188,688 and reported 6,287,362 cases, an increase of 26,146 cases from its previous count.

The CDC reported its tally of cases of the respiratory illness known as COVID-19, caused by a new coronavirus, as of 4 pm ET on Sept. 7 versus its previous report a day earlier.

The CDC figures do not necessarily reflect cases reported by individual states.

(Reporting by Trisha Roy in Bengaluru; Editing by Aditya Soni)