Vaccine Panic At The Times

The Times delivers some vaccine porn for their Upper West Side readership - OMG, we won't vaccinate 70% of the world agasint COVID!

Its is only VERY late in the story we hear from experts who wonder whether that goal still makes any sense (spoiler - it probaby doesn't.)

Here we go:

The Drive to Vaccinate the World Against Covid Is Losing Steam

Rates are stalling in most low-income countries well short of the W.H.O.’s goal to immunize 70 percent of people in every nation. Some public health experts believe the momentum is gone forever.

In the middle of last year, the World Health Organization began promoting an ambitious goal, one it said was essential for ending the pandemic: fully vaccinate 70 percent of the population in every country against Covid-19 by June 2022.

Now, it is clear that the world will fall far short of that target by the deadline. And there is a growing sense of resignation among public health experts that high Covid vaccination coverage may never be achieved in most lower-income countries, as badly needed funding from the United States dries up and both governments and donors turn to other priorities.

...

Countries in different parts of the world, including some in Eastern Europe and the Middle East, have seen their vaccination rates stagnate in recent months at a third or less of their populations. But Africa’s vaccination rate remain the most dismal.

...

Fewer than 17 percent of Africans have received a primary Covid immunization. Nearly half of the vaccine doses delivered to the continent thus far have gone unused. Last month, the number of doses injected on the continent fell by 35 percent compared to February. W.H.O. officials attributed the drop to mass vaccination pushes being replaced by smaller-scale campaigns in several countries.

Some global health experts say the world missed a prime opportunity last year to provide vaccines to lower-income countries, when the public was more fearful of Covid and motivated to get vaccinated.

“There was a time people were very desperate to get vaccinated, but the vaccines were not there. And then they realized that without the vaccination, they didn’t die,” said Dr. Adewole, who wants to see countries continue to pursue the 70 percent target.

Yeah, well, experience can be a valuable teacher. But why is the momentum gone? A shortage of vaccines? Well, no:

The African Union still aims to vaccinate 70 percent of its population by the end of 2022. But with countries slow to use up donated vaccines, the bloc has not exercised its options to order more doses of the shots from Johnson & Johnson and Moderna.

The South African drugmaker Aspen Pharmacare earlier this year finalized a deal to bottle and market the Johnson & Johnson vaccine across Africa, a contract that was billed as an early step toward Africa’s development of a robust vaccine production industry. Aspen geared up for production, but no buyers, including the African Union and Covax, have placed orders yet, said Stephen Saad, Aspen’s chief executive.

The Serum Institute of India, the world’s largest vaccine maker, stopped its production of Covid shots in December last year, when its stockpile grew to 200 million doses; Bharat Biotech, another Indian firm that was a major producer, also stopped making vaccines in the face of low demand. The companies say they have no further orders since their contracts with the Indian government ended in March.

The loss of public demand is eventually adddressed head-on - vaccines aren't great agasint Omicron and anyway, most people have had COVID:

The vaccine regimens that had been planned for the developing world offered little protection against infection with the Omicron variant. And as sub-Saharan African countries were shut out of vaccine distribution for much of last year, more and more Africans gained protection against the virus from natural infection, which studies have shown works as well as two mRNA doses in preventing infection. New data from the W.H.O. shows that at least two-thirds of Africans had been infected with the virus before the Omicron wave.

If 67% of the population had effective immunity prior to Omicron, the 70% goal has surely been achieved the hard way. Many experts are saying the focus should be on the vulnerable:

Given these factors, some public health experts in Africa say the broad 70 percent goal no longer makes sense. “There’s very little value to it. In fact, we will gain much more by getting to more than 90 percent of people above the age of 50,” said Shabir Madhi, a professor of vaccinology and the dean of the faculty of health sciences at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg. About two-thirds of South Africans above age 50 are currently fully vaccinated.

Dr. Madhi said that South Africa could close down mass vaccination sites and instead redouble its efforts to seek out the most vulnerable at church services and at government offices that pay out monthly pension benefits.

Katherine O’Brien, who directs the W.H.O.’s work on vaccines and immunizations, said the agency encourages countries to focus on its most vulnerable citizens rather than vaccinating “a random set of 70 percent” of their populations. The aspiration she said, has always been “100 percent of health workers, 100 percent of older adults, 100 percent of pregnant women, 100 percent of the people who fall into those highest risk groups.”

Vax the vulnerabble! Seems like common sense. But the Times can't leave their readers there, so they close with a plaintive plea for social equality:

Some public health experts said that while the 70 percent vaccination threshold is clearly not achievable by its original deadline, it would be unwise and unethical to give up on that target over a longer time horizon. They expressed frustration about the growing gulf between wealthy countries vaccinating young children and offering healthy adults fourth vaccine doses, and the regions where the majority of people still do not have one dose.

“Why are we making it one target for high-income countries and one target for low income?” said Dr. Ayoade Alakija, a co-chair of the African Union’s vaccine delivery program.

She said that even though many people in sub-Saharan Africa have been infected, there is still need for the additional protection that would come from a high level of vaccination coverage.

Modest vaccination coverage, she said, “is not considered a good enough level of protection in England, it’s not a good enough level of protection in America. How is it OK not to be aiming for the very maximum, maximum we can? Aim for the sky and get to the top of the tree.”

That's the spirit! Why should countries with a much younger population and very different public health challenges be treated differently from the US or the UK?

 

 

 

Comments

[jim nj]

Two assessments of the Ukraine war:

https://militaryland.net/ukraine/invasion-day-62-summary/

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-april-26

[Pinandpuller]

I don’t know who needs to know this (Donald Trump), but if your ‘Normie’ Twitter account got got, all you really need to do is go and get a new email account and a Google Voice number and pick an ‘At’ that’s unrelated to your ‘rekt’ account.

When it sends your new phone number a confirmation text you go to the menu in your Google Voice menu and choose ‘messages’.

There you go Mr Trump. If you go down, go down for being spicy and subverting the so called ‘Conventional Wisdom’.

Try not to be a retard.

[Pinandpuller]

*redundant ‘menu’

Always Be Correcting the Record.

[MissMarple2]

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/apr/26/durham-gps-fusion-employees-emailed-reporters-unve/

Durham says the research firm sent hundreds of emails with unverified dirt on Trump to reporters. He has them and they say this undercuts the Clinton campaign’s campaign that the emails should be protected by attorney- client privilege.

[Neo]

When you print more money it means there are more dollars chasing the same amount of goods and services, which causes prices to rise. In just the past three fiscal years, federal spending has swollen to nearly $7 trillion a year, up from about $4.4 trillion in fiscal year 2019. Spending was $6.6 trillion in 2020, and $6.8 trillion in 2021.

If we want to put this into perspective, we can take a look at the monetary supply at the beginning of 2020, which showed just $4.0192 trillion in circulation. By January 2021, that number had jumped up to $6.7 trillion — but this was only the beginning.

By November of last year, that number climbed to $20.354 trillion dollars in circulation — meaning that since January 2020, the United States has printed nearly 80% of all US dollars in existence.

https://thefreethoughtproject.com/80-of-all-us-dollars-in-existence-have-been-printed-in-just-the-last-two-years/

[Alison]

@davod
there's nothing better than some morning doga with your dog (my_aussie_gal IG), (29)

https://twitter.com/i/status/1518946874283155456

Check all of this dog's videos on Instagram @my_aussie_gal! She knows hundreds of commands and tricks. Currently battling some type of cancer but they are treating it very aggressively. The owner is an amazing dog trainer and that might be one of those "once in a lifetime" dogs too.

[MissMarple2]

https://www.zerohedge.com/economics/chronic-shortages-few-items-now-will-evolve-chronic-shortages-hundreds-products-later

[Davod]

Alison. Thanks for letting me know.

[sbwaters]

New thead.