Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

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vijayk
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by vijayk »

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanr ... 0/fulltext
Summary
Background
Multiple early reports of patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19 showed that patients with chronic respiratory disease were significantly under-represented in these cohorts. We hypothesised that the widespread use of inhaled glucocorticoids among these patients was responsible for this finding, and tested if inhaled glucocorticoids would be an effective treatment for early COVID-19.
Methods
We performed an open-label, parallel-group, phase 2, randomised controlled trial (Steroids in COVID-19; STOIC) of inhaled budesonide, compared with usual care, in adults within 7 days of the onset of mild COVID-19 symptoms. The trial was done in the community in Oxfordshire, UK. Participants were randomly assigned to inhaled budsonide or usual care stratified for age (≤40 years or >40 years), sex (male or female), and number of comorbidities (≤1 and ≥2). Randomisation was done using random sequence generation in block randomisation in a 1:1 ratio. Budesonide dry powder was delivered using a turbohaler at a dose of 400 μg per actuation. Participants were asked to take two inhalations twice a day until symptom resolution. The primary endpoint was COVID-19-related urgent care visit, including emergency department assessment or hospitalisation, analysed for both the per-protocol and intention-to-treat (ITT) populations. The secondary outcomes were self-reported clinical recovery (symptom resolution), viral symptoms measured using the Common Cold Questionnare (CCQ) and the InFLUenza Patient Reported Outcome Questionnaire (FLUPro), body temperature, blood oxygen saturations, and SARS-CoV-2 viral load. The trial was stopped early after independent statistical review concluded that study outcome would not change with further participant enrolment. This trial is registered with ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT04416399.
Findings
From July 16 to Dec 9, 2020, 167 participants were recruited and assessed for eligibility. 21 did not meet eligibility criteria and were excluded. 146 participants were randomly assigned—73 to usual care and 73 to budesonide. For the per-protocol population (n=139), the primary outcome occurred in ten (14%) of 70 participants in the usual care group and one (1%) of 69 participants in the budesonide group (difference in proportions 0·131, 95% CI 0·043 to 0·218; p=0·004). For the ITT population, the primary outcome occurred in 11 (15%) participants in the usual care group and two (3%) participants in the budesonide group (difference in proportions 0·123, 95% CI 0·033 to 0·213; p=0·009). The number needed to treat with inhaled budesonide to reduce COVID-19 deterioration was eight. Clinical recovery was 1 day shorter in the budesonide group compared with the usual care group (median 7 days [95% CI 6 to 9] in the budesonide group vs 8 days [7 to 11] in the usual care group; log-rank test p=0·007). The mean proportion of days with a fever in the first 14 days was lower in the budesonide group (2%, SD 6) than the usual care group (8%, SD 18; Wilcoxon test p=0·051) and the proportion of participants with at least 1 day of fever was lower in the budesonide group when compared with the usual care group. As-needed antipyretic medication was required for fewer proportion of days in the budesonide group compared with the usual care group (27% [IQR 0–50] vs 50% [15–71]; p=0·025) Fewer participants randomly assigned to budesonide had persistent symptoms at days 14 and 28 compared with participants receiving usual care (difference in proportions 0·204, 95% CI 0·075 to 0·334; p=0·003). The mean total score change in the CCQ and FLUPro over 14 days was significantly better in the budesonide group compared with the usual care group (CCQ mean difference −0·12, 95% CI −0·21 to −0·02 [p=0·016]; FLUPro mean difference −0·10, 95% CI −0·21 to −0·00 [p=0·044]). Blood oxygen saturations and SARS-CoV-2 load, measured by cycle threshold, were not different between the groups. Budesonide was safe, with only five (7%) participants reporting self-limiting adverse events.
Interpretation
Early administration of inhaled budesonide reduced the likelihood of needing urgent medical care and reduced time to recovery after early COVID-19.
Funding
National Institute for Health Research Biomedical Research Centre and AstraZeneca.
This is Latest

BudeCort 400 (Cipla) will prevent Severity of COVID19 Infections,

reduces Hospitalisation if used Early stages of Infection

As per Lancet (I Rank Journal)
April 2021 published.
vijayk
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by vijayk »

Telugu doctor is recommending this




Here it is American version
sudeepj
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by sudeepj »

sohamn wrote:
As a Modi Bhakt, I am really disappointed with all the inaction during the lull period of COVID. Since, I give him, and not the babu's, credit for all the successes he accomplished - I have to also hold him accountable for the failure. This fiasco was avoidable as we had 6 months to prepare but we didn't. Modi didn't help because he was having huge rallies until last week where none of the BJP honchos were wearing masks, in Uttarakhand his government was also not holding anyone accountable for the Kumbh Mela debacle. As a leader, when we noticed that babu's were doing nothing then he should have taken them to task but nothing of that sort happened. Until a month back his administration including Dr. Harsh Vardhan was openly claiming that COVID in india was over and we defeated covid when no other country could.
Medical decision making has been behind the curve or downright nonsensical in almost every country, e.g. the AZ vaccinations in EU. India got it right for an year, but slipped up in 2021. Alarm bells should have been ringing in all govt departments when we entered march with 20,000 patients a day, but they didnt. None of the 'infectious disease' overnight experts and specialists who are now crawling out of the wood work were trying to raise the alarm either.

But the govt. did wake up by the second week of April.. And their decision making in 2020 was great. If it were not for their decisions in 2020, we would be facing back in June/July 2020 what we are facing today. Most of the credit for these tough decisions has to go to the one man who was capable of taking them.

Today we have two vaccines, 40% of our most vulnerable 45+ age group have gotten at least one vaccine shot. The rest should be vaccinated in the next month or two. Facilities and protocols that had been wound down over the past year will come back up again. Food security will be taken care of.

Its darkest before dawn. Over the past few days, the pace of growth in newly infected has indeed come down a bit. The next few weeks will be stressful, but we will get across.

Once we get some breathing room, there needs to be a stock taking in the cabinet and people in the health ministry who dropped the ball, when they had a full year to get a handle on what this disease is, what its dynamics are have to go. Esp that guy harsh mardan and the I&B minister who appears to think his job is to give interviews to hostile news channels.

If Indians are hesitating in taking vaccines, its his job to rope in celebrities, launch a massive PR campaign to get people to vaccinate. Its his job to punish people who are spreading rumors and disinformation about vaccinations. Today, wars are waged by seeding false and fake information among the masses. Its his job to protect the Indian population from these lies. Why cant he demand twitter and fb and wa are as aggressive in taking down anti vaccine nonsense, anti mask nonsense as aggressively as they have in the west? Or how these companies kow-tow to China.. Why cant he punish the lalas running the newspapers that give daily bread to these reporters? These two departments need see some heads roll.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by chanakyaa »

@ians tweet
Amid reports of shortage of oxygen in the hospitals during the second wave of #Covid across the country, India will be importing #oxygen generation plants and containers from Germany to cater the shortage.
.
.
Government sources said that 23 mobile oxygen generation plants are being airlifted from Germany. These will be deployed in static hospitals and provide adequate oxygen to the needy.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by disha »

And some very late breaking, but good news among all gloom and doom

https://swarajyamag.com/insta/sanotizes ... e-2-trials
SaNOtize's Nasal Spray Treatment For Covid-19 Highly Effective, Viral Load Reduces By 95% In 24 Hours: Phase-2 Trials

Pharmaceutical company SaNOtize in-collaboration with NHS hospitals in the UK announced the results of the phase-2 trials of the Nitric Oxide Nasal Spray (NONS), which is a nasal spray based treatment for Covid-19.
And an earlier news items:

https://www.pharmacytimes.com/view/clin ... f-covid-19

Can the above regimen be modified in hospital setting to provide a small dosage of nitric oxide?
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Srutayus »

Image
There probably is more to this virus given how persistent and adaptable it is turning out to be.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by DrRatnadip »

vijayk wrote:Guys! People are dying in 3 days after detection or got +ve.

May be symptoms are not showing till all the lungs are infected.

Question to the doctors

Is there prophylactic or something like ivermectin or weaker steroid that can give to people to prevent infections?

Can we explore to use the nasal vaccine clinical trial to larger population?
-Two days back I admitted a 26 year old female with covid.. she was absolutely normal 3 days back.. she then developed irrelevant talk and mild to moderate fever.. No respiratory complaints.. within one day she became unconcious.. CT severity score was 6 (mild disease).. Her inflamatory markers were haywire.. Her respiratory system was good but virus or associated immune response damaged her nervous system leading to encephalopathy and myopathy.. In few young pts virus is presenting with uncommon symptoms..

-No role of steroids in prophylaxis.. Ivermectin we are using in confirmed close contacts and in mild cases..
disha
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by disha »

DrRatnadip wrote: -Two days back I admitted a 26 year old female with covid.. she was absolutely normal 3 days back.. she then developed irrelevant talk and mild to moderate fever.. No respiratory complaints.. within one day she became unconcious.. CT severity score was 6 (mild disease).. Her inflamatory markers were haywire.. Her respiratory system was good but virus or associated immune response damaged her nervous system leading to encephalopathy and myopathy.. In few young pts virus is presenting with uncommon symptoms..

-No role of steroids in prophylaxis.. Ivermectin we are using in confirmed close contacts and in mild cases..
Can the Nitric Oxide nasal spray work? Nitric Oxide nasal sprays are over the counter in many countries. Can it be done in a clinical setting? Anyway, the patient may collapse, but it will help if the virus load decreases and the patient recovers.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Manish_P »

Very Good to see you, Dr Ratnadip. Hope you are doing well (under the circumstances). A year ago you were a big source of info and comfort to this forum. Although this post of yours is a bit scary, I really look forward to your factual posting and updates. Please take care.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by nvishal »

We went from 1.33 lakh active cases in feb21 to 24 lakh cases now. I could not find any data of how many are actual hospitalization cases. Let's assume 1/3rd, ie, 8 lakh need critical support.

Red hot regions are:
1) delhi-up-bihar-wb corridor
2) mah-north karnataka-telangana-chatissgarh corridor
3) kerala
4) chennai region
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by nam »

hindsight is 20/20 but we should have approved sputnik in Jan and started manufacturing. we should be doing 6- 7 million a day instead of the current 3-4
It has only been 3 months since major vaccines have been approved. It is not possible to have 6 million doses per day within such a short period. mRNA vaccines which are easier to produce, yet US with all the export blocks has not been able to achieve this vaccination level.

The only way out was for people was to take precautions until they got the vaccine. But then life in India is cheap. People cannot skip shopping in crowded market, attending weddings, functions with relatives :roll:

Until someone in the family dies, we Indians don't take any pandemic seriously. Govt does force people to attend weddings.

I had to constantly strictly tell my parents, not even to dream about attending weddings.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Raja »

Govt. cannot be blameless. Govt. allowed cricket matches full of people. Govt. held election rallies with thousands of people. Govt. sent out several other mixed signals. Opposition played its part by making a drama over the correct steps that were taken by the Govt. during the first wave. People might have still did what they always do, but Govt. could have also taken more calibrated actions. Opposition could have been more mature (and also taken steps in the states ruled by them). If we simply just blame it on stupid people, we will not make any progress. Everyone has made mistakes and everyone should learn from it.

Vaccination was *never* going to make a major impact on the 2nd wave. Crying about the few tens of million vaccine exports is pointless as it would have done NOTHING to stop this wave. We need to have 600 million + vaccinations done before we can even hope for it to make a big difference. We never had the time for that.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by sooraj »

Drugs Controller General of India (DGCI) approves emergency use for Zydus Cadila's Pegylated Interferon alpha-2b, 'Virafin' for treating moderate COVID19 infection in adults.
Karan M
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Karan M »

vijayk wrote:Guys! People are dying in 3 days after detection or got +ve.

May be symptoms are not showing till all the lungs are infected.

Question to the doctors

Is there prophylactic or something like ivermectin or weaker steroid that can give to people to prevent infections?

Can we explore to use the nasal vaccine clinical trial to larger population?
Contact your Dr for Ivermectin prophylaxis. Dont self-medicate.

If they ask for data show them this:
https://www.pharmaceutical-technology.c ... -covid-19/
Link to Study
A study by All India Institutes of Medical Sciences (AIIMS)-Bhubaneswar in the Indian state of Odisha found that two doses of potential drug ivermectin prophylaxis resulted in a 73% reduction in Covid-19 infection.

Between 20 September and 19 October, 12 physicians of AIIMS-Bhubaneshwar conducted the study on healthcare workers (HCWs) at risk of virus exposure.

Ivermectin is one among several potential drugs currently in trials for its therapeutic and preventive role in Covid-19 infection.

Performed on two sets of HCWs, the study evaluated the association between the drug and development of Covid-19 infection, The New Indian Express reported.

In the two-cohort study, one set of HCWs received two-dose ivermectin prophylaxis at a dose of 300 μg / kg with a gap of 72 hours while workers in the other group received other prophylaxis.

With around 4,600 employees, over 625 employees of the institute tested positive for Covid-19.

The month-long study took place using 372 participants, including doctors, nurses, paramedics and sanitisation workers.

Based on WHO risk assessment guidelines, the contact tracing team of the institute made the list depending on subjects’ exposure to the disease.

AIIMS Director and corresponding author of the study Gitanjali Batmanabane said: “Earlier, at least 20 to 25 HCWs were getting infected with the virus daily. After the workers started taking ivermectin, the number of infection has come down to one or two per day.”

ICMR guidelines advised HCWs of AIIMS Bhubaneswar to use hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) prophylaxis from 11 April along with the appropriate Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) depending on their place of posting.

However, on account of known side-effect, the uptake was not encouraging.

The study also found that single-dose of the potential drug has no association with the reduction of infection in Covid-19 patients.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by madhu »

If we take any vaccine we cannot donate blood for 4 months. Now that we are giving whole mass, vaccine who will we get blood for needed? After oxygen next will be blood shortage.

One more reason to blame modi.
Karan M
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Karan M »

sohamn wrote:
As a Modi Bhakt, I am really disappointed with all the inaction during the lull period of COVID. Since, I give him, and not the babu's, credit for all the successes he accomplished - I have to also hold him accountable for the failure. This fiasco was avoidable as we had 6 months to prepare but we didn't. Modi didn't help because he was having huge rallies until last week where none of the BJP honchos were wearing masks, in Uttarakhand his government was also not holding anyone accountable for the Kumbh Mela debacle. As a leader, when we noticed that babu's were doing nothing then he should have taken them to task but nothing of that sort happened. Until a month back his administration including Dr. Harsh Vardhan was openly claiming that COVID in india was over and we defeated covid when no other country could.
I personally dislike the use of the term bhakt, something that should be associated with religious faith etc, but anyhow, Modi is not an epidemiologist. He is a politician. It was the task of the MOHFW to be providing inputs and telling him and others about the risk factors. So insofar he bears blame, it is the same for the other politicos all of whom were clearly of the opinion we had got over the hump. Many Drs too believed this. It just speaks of systematic shortcomings within whole GOI. The bigger issue is also the lack of governance at state level which have got used to central funding and money and assistance for crisis management. We really need some sort of revamp of the whole decision making structure. I have been hearing multiple accounts of how within moments of directive, admin officials are setting up infra. Qn is why did they wait, and that is the issue - the lack of empowerment and accountability at the bureaucratic level which is our real issue. If you need politicians to tell you common sensical things, and their approval for everything, it means the system is an issue.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by chetak »

Karan M wrote:It just speaks of systematic shortcomings within whole GOI. The bigger issue is also the lack of governance at state level which have got used to central funding and money and assistance for crisis management. We really need some sort of revamp of the whole decision making structure. I have been hearing multiple accounts of how within moments of directive, admin officials are setting up infra. Qn is why did they wait, and that is the issue - the lack of empowerment and accountability at the bureaucratic level which is our real issue. If you need politicians to tell you common sensical things, and their approval for everything, it means the system is an issue.
I have seen this too many times to mistake it for anything else.

These guys have had their darbari privileges curtailed, money making opportunities have evaporated, there is no institutional "gossip" to sustain them, keep their marketable influence intact and their patronage possibilities are currently nonexistent unless they want the ED to come calling.

They have all told their bosses with the utmost sincerity at their crooked command and with the straightest of faces, used only when barefacedly lying, to assure them of their utmost cooperation and this dreaded phrase is trotted out without fail: "sir, we are all with you and we will do exactly as you say"

which means that unless they get directions, every single minute of every day, they will sit back and "wait for aadesh from the mantri or the boss".

and when asked why did you not do this, they will innocently say "sir, we did not get any aadesh from you so we were waiting" Please tell us what to do now

each and every one of these @h0!e$ knows very well how to play the game and how to stay "blameless" because, that is what their mussoorie training is all about

this is what is happening with the congi pasand parivaari and darbaari babooze. The others will simply not rock the boat because of the dreaded "annual confidential report" syndrome and the threat of transfer to some irrelevant position.

In the meantime, they are all waiting it out for the BJP storm to pass and the benign and generous eyetalian sun to shine on them once again

BTW, health, as well as, disaster management are both stage subjects and every babooze knows it well, as do indeed, the state govts
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Ambar »

We are self-flagellating about something which was inevitable. Even if we had replaced our entire government machinery from MPs to bureaucrats with that from a well run Scandinavian country the result would have still been the same. Yes, undoubtedly we should have prepared for higher o2 consumption, ventilators, ICUs, hospital capacity etc. but the 2nd wave would have stills struck us and struck us hard. In a country with 1.33 billion people , it doesn't take much to overwhelm the healthcare system.

The only thing to do is to add capacity as quickly as possible and continue vaccinating . The 3 days lockdown/1 week lockdown etc will do little to nothing to stem the cases, the only outcome of such haphazard decisions is to increase the long term economic woes . As for our aam jaanta, give a month or two when cases begin dropping as the monsoon sets in firmly, they'll go back to thronging weddings, bars, restaurants, birthday parties etc. you cannot fix stupid.

Hopefully sometime in the later part of this year more and more potent antiviral drugs will come into the market along with newer and better vaccines. There are atleast 3 nasal antiviral drugs that i know of that are under trials, i have no doubt we will overcome this with time and some common sense.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by chanakyaa »

Speaking of identifying COVID waves and taking pre-emptive measures, it seems like the the peak infections have occurred in close correlation to flu seasons in countries with sizable population. I'm not an expert, just trying connect some dauts. We had only one year of data, so not enough data points to conclusively say about the patterns. For India, measured lock downs or massive awareness around the flu season (Feb-March and Aug-Sep) could help avoid such disasters in the future, until we are fully vaccinated. Not just Feb-March and Aug-Sep of 2021, but 2022 also to be safe. There are 28 states, 28 chief ministers, 28 health ministers, and countless secretaries and department babus. When will people start demanding action from this babu-cracy instead of tirelessly beating that mudi piñata?
Last edited by chanakyaa on 23 Apr 2021 19:23, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by arshyam »

madhu wrote:If we take any vaccine we cannot donate blood for 4 months. Now that we are giving whole mass, vaccine who will we get blood for needed? After oxygen next will be blood shortage.

One more reason to blame modi.
Could you please suggest this to the PGPortal or PMO portal?

Assuming that 4 month rule is true, it's a good point. Maybe some doctors could weigh in on this here?
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by sajo »

sooraj wrote:Drugs Controller General of India (DGCI) approves emergency use for Zydus Cadila's Pegylated Interferon alpha-2b, 'Virafin' for treating moderate COVID19 infection in adults.
This is.... encouraging news ?

Can they start jabbing away at anyone who is symptomatic and has a +ve test report as early as possible, provided its not very expensive ? Can experts comment on if this desperate measure would work to bring down hospital and ICU loads ?
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Uttam »

https://www.theguardian.com/society/202 ... y-65-study

The govt. should seriously consider delaying the second dose and making more people get at least one dose of the vaccine. Oxford (Covidshield) was found to be 76% effective after two doses and now this research finds its effectiveness of 65% after one dose against infection. This difference is very small if you account for standard errors in these results.

Right now, they focus on vaccinating as many people as possible.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Suraj »

I posted this on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/surajbrf/status/138 ... 88929?s=21

Rather than arguing, I tried to understand how much of the ‘why didn’t the government act in Feb or earlier ?’ with data . Look thru those states graphs. If you were in charge of any given state, how easily can you predict mid April in February ? Or even in mid March ?

In most states you can’t . One must remember that the price of being over cautious and responding to every false positive spike is very high too.

Don’t make the mistake of using 20/20 hindsight approach steeped in confirmation bias. Take Feb or March in complete isolation and try to establish how well one could projects raging wave within 2 weeks ?

Anyone who can devise a good repeatable data driven approach to do this would be being very helpful . But it’s important to avoid being swayed by confirmation bias here.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Raja »

Suraj wrote:
Don’t make the mistake of using 20/20 hindsight approach steeped in confirmation bias. Take Feb or March in complete isolation and try to establish how well one could projects raging wave within 2 weeks ?
We saw a second wave everywhere else in the world. To me there was never a doubt that there will be a second wave. Even with 30+% vaccination of high risk group, there is a very high %age of people who are not vaccinated.

It is tempting to think that okay but then the death rate should be still lower than last year because we have 30% of the high risk group vaccinated. However, last year we had a strict nationwide lockdown very early on. So the mortality rates are not comparable as the base potential is much higher. Probably vaccination is helping, but vaccination rates are not high enough to account for the fact that we have no nationwide lockdown. What we are seeing now is just a glimpse of what would have happened last year if the govt. had not taken the steps. In fact, you yourself were arguing this point that without lockdown we would have suffered heavily. As such, we cannot rely on the numbers from last year to be a good guide of what happens without lockdown.

The plan was always to do localized shutdowns when there are spikes. However, we really did not do that and I am not sure if the testing was robust enough to allow us to do that even.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Raja »

chanakyaa wrote:Not just Feb-March and Aug-Sep of 2021, but 2022 also to be safe.
100% agree.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Suraj »

Raja wrote:The plan was always to do localized shutdowns when there are spikes. However, we really did not do that and I am not sure if the testing was robust enough to allow us to do that even.
That's not a plan. It's a nice idea, but not a plan.

Also, anecdotal assertion based claims 'we all knew it was going to happen in March' is not a basis. How would that work - a Gallup poll every month ?

The goal with any good mechanism is not to try to show it worked, but to show all the ways one tried to make it fail, but could not do so.

Applied here, this means that many have said 'Mth wave will be in Month N'. You may be right in hindsight, but what about all the people who were wrong about prior months ? What makes you so right that the world can reliably believe your precision ?

This isn't a harsh personal attack - I'm trying state a point here. It's not a matter of 'I was right this time'. Covid early warning needs something more robust.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Suraj »

2.8 million doses to 8pm, 138.2 million cumulative.

https://www.pib.gov.in/PressReleseDetai ... ID=1713653

Except for a one day blip for Ram Navami, the pace has remained strong, which is heartening given what a rough week it's been.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Kakkaji »

Suraj wrote:2.8 million doses to 8pm, 138.2 million cumulative.

https://www.pib.gov.in/PressReleseDetai ... ID=1713653

Except for a one day blip for Ram Navami, the pace has remained strong, which is heartening given what a rough week it's been.
If you look at the daily numbers, more seniors (60+) are getting a second dose than first. That implies to me that this group would have mostly completed its vaccination in two months from now.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by saip »

arshyam wrote:
madhu wrote:If we take any vaccine we cannot donate blood for 4 months. Now that we are giving whole mass, vaccine who will we get blood for needed? After oxygen next will be blood shortage.

One more reason to blame modi.
Could you please suggest this to the PGPortal or PMO portal?

Assuming that 4 month rule is true, it's a good point. Maybe some doctors could weigh in on this here?
Where did you get this FOUR MONTH wait time? According to American Red Cross the wait time is much shorter Two weeks to none.
In most cases, there is no deferral time for individuals who received a COVID-19 vaccine as long as they are symptom free and feeling well at the time of donation. The following eligibility guidelines apply to each COVID-19 vaccine received, including boosters:
US Red Cross
Atmavik
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Atmavik »

Kakkaji wrote:
Suraj wrote:2.8 million doses to 8pm, 138.2 million cumulative.

https://www.pib.gov.in/PressReleseDetai ... ID=1713653

Except for a one day blip for Ram Navami, the pace has remained strong, which is heartening given what a rough week it's been.
If you look at the daily numbers, more seniors (60+) are getting a second dose than first. That implies to me that this group would have mostly completed its vaccination in two months from now.

This is true, my parents got their second shot and said most people with them in the hospital were there for the second shot and were from the 60+ group.

We also need to educate that vaccination does not mean u give up mask wearing and social distancing.
vijayk
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by vijayk »

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... my-kitchen
A Scientist Stopped By and Made Covid Vaccine in My Kitchen
All the materials -- saline solution, small pieces of proteins that are similar to those of the coronavirus, and cross-linking chemicals including one called chitosan that’s made from shellfish and insect carapaces -- can be bought online with no special licenses or permission. And the recipe is open-source, meaning anyone can use it.

“We want other people to have the design,” Estep said. “So we share the design and start making the vaccine, and then we start testing it on ourselves.”
Here’s how the vaccine is supposed to work: The vaccine is essentially an amalgam of portions of coronavirus proteins that the human immune system recognizes. RaDVaC takes those pieces, called peptides, and uses chitosan to pull them together into nanoparticles that are similar in size to viruses.

The nanoparticles have a positive charge, and when they’re snorted, they’re attracted to the negatively charged nasal lining. The scientists hope the particles will be recognized by the body’s immune system, which would then prime protective antibodies and T-cells to respond in the event of a real infection. Protecting nasal tissue is key, because that’s where the virus is thought to frequently enter the body. The idea has been shown to work in animal experiments, Estep said.
Inside the box were a magnetic stirring plate, a beaker, pipetting equipment and a sterilizing agent. The cooler held the peptides and chitosan.

Dousing his gloved hands in isopropyl alcohol at every step of the way, Estep showed me how to slowly mix the peptides and chitosan to form nanoparticles, invisible to the naked eye. We let it sit for a few minutes, and then he sprayed the solution into his nose for what he said was the 10th time. Side effects are minimal, he said.
https://radvac.org/wp-content/uploads/2 ... -4-1-2.pdf

If anyone in India wants to take initiative or know any group who can do this, we can find the equipment and donate. Any takers?
Zynda
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Zynda »

sooraj wrote:Drugs Controller General of India (DGCI) approves emergency use for Zydus Cadila's Pegylated Interferon alpha-2b, 'Virafin' for treating moderate COVID19 infection in adults.
In one of the NDTV interviews, Zydus CEO (I think) mentioned that current production rate is just 50k/month and they are hoping that in 45-60 days, they can produce 10-15 lakh doses/month. The product requires importing from EU...so if they resort of export restrictions...lots of moving parts and hopefully things will pan out.

If trials were so encouraging (even by end of Ph-2), no work was initiated to ramp up production...I get the "storm" of 2nd wave (or the speed of it at least) took us by surprise, but seeing signs of mismanagement and lack of planning...
Karan M
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Karan M »

Ambar wrote:We are self-flagellating about something which was inevitable. Even if we had replaced our entire government machinery from MPs to bureaucrats with that from a well run Scandinavian country the result would have still been the same. Yes, undoubtedly we should have prepared for higher o2 consumption, ventilators, ICUs, hospital capacity etc. but the 2nd wave would have stills struck us and struck us hard. In a country with 1.33 billion people , it doesn't take much to overwhelm the healthcare system.
I disagree with the general theme and that the scandinavian or any other country comparison is even germane, in terms of being some great decision makers. If it was inevitable then its even more galling that we didnt do enough to prep for the response.

This is the standard, irrespective of what we do we get hit argument. It really doesnt matter if you do, what does matter is how you respond. This is where the state and then the center admin's dropped the ball. There were no SOPs in place to rapidly address shortages, especially at the state level. Literally no urgency in addressing the public's key challenges in accessing healthcare or even data driven approaches to giving most, basic answers in a short timeframe. For the center to not realize this would occur in Maha and Delhi, knowing how badly both were run, is again inexplicable.

No anticipation that shortages would proceed as did the disease in a surge, exponentially. The organized approach, the quick response were both missing till NaMo arrived back and took charge. Even now, people are crowd sourcing answers for what the bureaucrats could have easily set up with the help of the pvt sector. Hopefully post event we will learn from the event and the PM/PMO will take harsh but necessary steps to streamline the non accountable bureaucracy and reform even how they themselves approached matters.
The only thing to do is to add capacity as quickly as possible and continue vaccinating . The 3 days lockdown/1 week lockdown etc will do little to nothing to stem the cases, the only outcome of such haphazard decisions is to increase the long term economic woes . As for our aam jaanta, give a month or two when cases begin dropping as the monsoon sets in firmly, they'll go back to thronging weddings, bars, restaurants, birthday parties etc. you cannot fix stupid.
Again disagree. The temporary lockdowns now will reduce the Tx chain which is important, given people are indisciplined. Capacity addition is now well underway anyhow, and vaccination will pick up too. But we need better focus on prophlyaxis and treatment protocols beyond existing meds, again two areas where MOHW has dropped the ball.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Uttam »

https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/ne ... 395779.ece

Just some anecdotal evidence: I heard from a few people that vaccination has slowed down because many people are demanding Covaxin instead of Covidshield. Are you guys hearing the same?

IMHO, this will not be a great strategy. The main reason why there are known risks from Covidshield and not from Covaxin is that Covidshield has been much more widely used and studied. Not saying that Covaxin is not safe, just that the risk-reward ratio of Covidshield is still favorable by a large margin. There are always some risks of every vaccine and there may be with Covaxin as well. At this point, people should get vaccinated as soon as possible whichever vaccine they can get.
Ambar
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Ambar »

Karan, my point is even the best prepared government with a robust public healthcare system will fail when hit by a pandemic of this proportion with 1.33 billion people to take care of where many are poor. Yes, as i've said many a times we should have prepared for increase in o2 consumption, ICUs, ventilators, ambulances etc, (which in my opinion we should be doing every year between mar and aug given the increase in flu cases), but beyond that any healthcare system will be overrun when hundreds of thousands fall ill suddenly. The other thing we seem to be forgetting are deaths and hospitalizations by other causes which will now increase significantly due to lack of hospital beds, doctors and other healthcare staff most of whom are geared towards saving covid flu patients. At the current trajectory i expect a million cases and 5k deaths/day by the time we peak .

I am probably imagining a ray of hope in all this but Chattisgarh and Maharashtra's rate of new case growth is slowing. MH, DL and CG combined contribute 50% of our total cases/fatalities. We are half way there if we can get these 3 cases under control, the flu in southern states usually remain until Jul so i suspect they will be the last ones to peak.

Everything aside we have an endemic issue of corruption which would have scuttled even the best prepared plans. I try not to add more gloom and doom to this already depressing thread but its hard to ignore the news channels showing wailing bereaved families being looted by ambulance drivers, morgues, hospitals and govt officials. With such fundamental issues we had set ourselves up for failure even before the pandemic. If indiscipline and poor governance doesn't kill us then greed certainly will.
Anujan
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Anujan »

Uttam wrote:https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/ne ... 395779.ece

Just some anecdotal evidence: I heard from a few people that vaccination has slowed down because many people are demanding Covaxin instead of Covidshield. Are you guys hearing the same?

IMHO, this will not be a great strategy. The main reason why there are known risks from Covidshield and not from Covaxin is that Covidshield has been much more widely used and studied. Not saying that Covaxin is not safe, just that the risk-reward ratio of Covidshield is still favorable by a large margin. There are always some risks of every vaccine and there may be with Covaxin as well. At this point, people should get vaccinated as soon as possible whichever vaccine they can get.
The best vaccine is one you can get now.

The "side effects" they speak of, goes away in one day.

Even during normal times, people fall sick several times a year, with cold, fevers and such. I do not know why people should care about one or two days of fever and a stiff arm.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Ashokk »

‘Americans first’: US cites domestic priorities to reject India’s vaccine plea
NEW DELHI: As India’s Covid crisis explodes, the US delivered a blow to India’s vaccination programme, indicating it would prioritise its own citizens before addressing India’s request for vaccine components.
Responding to journalists, the US State Department spokesperson said, “we have a special responsibility to the American people”.
“It's of course not only in our interest to see Americans vaccinated; it’s in the interests of the rest of the world to see Americans vaccinated.” The implied subtext was that Indians’ vaccination was less important.
Foreign minister S Jaishankar has held a couple of rounds of discussions with his counterpart Anthony Blinken on the easing of the US export embargo. Foreign secretary Harsh Shringla has held similar discussions with Wendy Sherman, US deputy secretary.
Washington sources said some US Congressmen have also expressed support. But that this is going to be a difficult one, is now clear.
Meanwhile, German chancellor Angela Merkel expressed doubts about helping India develop its pharma sector, especially as India has tightened its pharma exports in the context of the ongoing Covid crisis.
Merkel was quoted as saying by Politico, “We now have a situation with India where, in connection with the emergency situation of the pandemic, we are worried whether the pharmaceutical products will still come to us,” observed Merkel.
“Of course, we have only allowed India to become such a large pharmaceutical producer in the first place, also from the European side, in the expectation that this should then also be complied with. If that is not the case now, we will have to rethink.”
Indicating that Germany might rethink its own industrial policies Merkel said, “The truth is, we haven’t treated our pharmaceutical industry so well for many years.”
On Thursday, John Nkengasong, director of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, warned India against blocking vaccine exports to Africa under the COVAX program.
“If you finish vaccinating your people before Africa or other parts of the world, you have not done yourself any justice because variants will emerge and undermine your own vaccination efforts“ Nkengasong said.
Most countries in Africa haven’t even begun their vaccinations, while many others have been reported as saying they don’t know whether they would be able to get their second jab at all.
srai
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by srai »

Anujan wrote:
Uttam wrote:https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/ne ... 395779.ece

Just some anecdotal evidence: I heard from a few people that vaccination has slowed down because many people are demanding Covaxin instead of Covidshield. Are you guys hearing the same?

IMHO, this will not be a great strategy. The main reason why there are known risks from Covidshield and not from Covaxin is that Covidshield has been much more widely used and studied. Not saying that Covaxin is not safe, just that the risk-reward ratio of Covidshield is still favorable by a large margin. There are always some risks of every vaccine and there may be with Covaxin as well. At this point, people should get vaccinated as soon as possible whichever vaccine they can get.
The best vaccine is one you can get now.

The "side effects" they speak of, goes away in one day.

Even during normal times, people fall sick several times a year, with cold, fevers and such. I do not know why people should care about one or two days of fever and a stiff arm.
+1

Main message promoted should be any of the COVID vaccines available reduces severity of symptoms if infected. Even with one dose the protection against severe cases ups 70% plus.
Bart S
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Bart S »

Anujan wrote:
Uttam wrote:https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/ne ... 395779.ece

Just some anecdotal evidence: I heard from a few people that vaccination has slowed down because many people are demanding Covaxin instead of Covidshield. Are you guys hearing the same?

IMHO, this will not be a great strategy. The main reason why there are known risks from Covidshield and not from Covaxin is that Covidshield has been much more widely used and studied. Not saying that Covaxin is not safe, just that the risk-reward ratio of Covidshield is still favorable by a large margin. There are always some risks of every vaccine and there may be with Covaxin as well. At this point, people should get vaccinated as soon as possible whichever vaccine they can get.
The best vaccine is one you can get now.

The "side effects" they speak of, goes away in one day.

Even during normal times, people fall sick several times a year, with cold, fevers and such. I do not know why people should care about one or two days of fever and a stiff arm.
I think the hesitation with Covishield is due to the reduced effectiveness against some variants of the disease like the South African one. Covaxin seems to be more comprehensive in it's protection, just like Sputnik.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by hnair »

Prof Rajeev Srinivasan's podcast and write-up about the frenzy around India's spike and also the hypocrisy

Ep. 26: The ‘stunning’ reaction to #India’s horrendous #Wuhanvirus wave

He is pointing out the scare-mongering nature in western reporting, right from the Surat Plague times.
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