Last year, the World Health Organization (WHO) began assigning Greek letters to worrying new variants of the coronavirus. The organization started with Alpha and swiftly worked its way through the Greek alphabet in the months that followed. When Omicron arrived in November, it was the 13th named variant in less than a year. But 10 […]
Most common current COVID lineages now derive from Omicron strain Read More »
After two-and-a-half years of tight pandemic controls, some of Asia’s last holdouts are opening their borders, as they move to bolster their economies and play catch-up with a world that has largely learned to live with COVID. Hong Kong said on Friday that it would abandon mandatory hotel quarantine for people coming to the city starting next week,
Countries across Asia open borders post-COVID Read More »
A new generation of COVID-19 vaccines that can be inhaled or sprayed up the nose—instead of taken by injection—will begin rolling out in Asia, though just how effective they are remains to be seen. Regulators in China and India have greenlighted distribution of vaccines delivered through the mouth or nose, a delivery that scientists say
A new generation of inhaled COVID vaccines Read More »
A Covid-like virus lurking in Russian bats could jump to humans, scientists warned today. American virologists who carried out experiments on the pathogen — called Khosta-2 — fear it is ‘completely resistant’ to vaccines deployed during the pandemic. They found it was able to latch onto human cells with ease in the same way as
Khosta-2, the next pandemic? Read More »
COVID cases in England and Wales have risen for the first time in two months – marking an end to a steady fall since early July. The increase means the total number of infections in the UK has also gone up, but levels are estimated to have fallen in Scotland and Northern Ireland. About 927,900
COVID cases in the UK begin to rise Read More »
Nigeria will start building a vaccine plant by end of the year after signing a contract manufacturing agreement with the Serum Institute of India for local production of the jabs, the country’s health minister said. The country struck the deal with the world’s biggest vaccine manufacturer on Wednesday, Health Minister Osagie Ehanire said at a
Nigeria to build new vaccine plant Read More »
China reported its first case of monkeypox, imported to the giant municipality of Chongqing, as the country continues its long and arduous battle against Covid-19. The patient was immediately put into quarantine after arriving in Chongqing and the risk of an outbreak is low, the local health commission said in a statement on its website
China reports first case of monkeypox Read More »
Two COVID-19 antibody therapies are no longer recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO), on the basis that Omicron and the variant’s latest offshoots have likely rendered them obsolete. www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/who-strongly-advises-against-use-two-covid-treatments-2022-09-15/? The two therapies – which are designed to work by binding to the spike protein of SARS-CoV-2 to neutralise the virus’ ability to infect cells
Two COVID-19 antibody therapies are no longer recommended by the WHO Read More »
A few years ago, researchers scoured the remains of 1867 people who lived between 30,000 and 150 years ago for genetic traces of variola, the virus that causes smallpox. In the teeth and bones of four Northern Europeans from the Viking era, they found enough DNA to reconstruct entire variola genomes. The sequenced viruses weren’t
Historical precedents for poxvirus mutation Read More »
Another new COVID variant is spreading – here’s what we know about omicron BA.4.6 BA.4.6, a subvariant of the omicron COVID variant which has been quickly gaining traction in the US, is now confirmed to be spreading in the UK. The latest briefing document on COVID variants from the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) noted
Yet another COVID variant – Omicron BA.4.6 Read More »
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