Category: Medical

JOHANNESBURG— A booster of US coronavirus vaccine Johnson & Johnson was 85 percent effective in preventing serious illness in areas where Omicron was dominant, a South African trial study indicated.

The South African Medical Research Council conducted the study on health workers from Nov 15 to Dec 20, but it has still not been peer-reviewed.

It found the top-up jab to largely protect staff in a country where the highly transmissible strain is now behind most Covid cases.

“Data from the… study confirm that the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 booster shot provides 85 percent effectiveness against hospitalization in areas where Omicron is dominant,” Johnson & Johnson said.

“This adds to our growing body of evidence which shows that the effectiveness of the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine remains strong and stable over time, including against circulating variants such as Omicron and Delta,” it said.

Around half a million South African health staff have received Johnson jabs as part of clinical trials.

Africa’s hardest-hit country, South Africa has recorded more than 3.4 million cases and 90,000 deaths since the start of the pandemic. An earlier South African study in December found the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine to be less effective overall against Omicron, but still prevented hospital admissions by up to 70 percent.

Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK

Roughly two years into the COVID-19 pandemic, no massive outbreaks have been reported in refugee camps to date. Health experts have some theories about why, but they also urge continued wariness against “the very real and present danger of widespread transmission” in camps, as the World Health Organization has cautioned.

The U.N. refugee agency, or UNHCR, “had been fearing — and preparing for — large outbreaks at refugee camps, which fortunately did not happen,” spokeswoman Aikaterini Kitidi acknowledged in an email exchange with VOA.

“However, this doesn’t mean we are out of the woods yet,” she said. With new variants such as omicron, “which are far more infectious, we may very well see more cases. We must remain vigilant and scale up surveillance and testing, as well as the equitable distribution of vaccines.”

UNHCR estimates that roughly 80 million people worldwide have been forcibly displaced by persecution and conflict, with most living in low-resource countries with frail health systems. Millions of them live in camps — some formal, some informal — with limited water and sanitation facilities. They also face overcrowding, making social distancing a challenge.

Yet comparatively few COVID infections have been reported in the camps: 55 Central African refugees tested positive in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, for instance, as UNHCR reported in a global COVID-19 response update of December 20.

Because of population density, “early on, we were concerned that [COVID-19] transmission would be very high and so would deaths, even with the younger demographics” of refugee camps, said Paul Spiegel, an epidemiologist who directs Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Humanitarian Health. “That hasn’t been the case that we’re aware of — but then data have been very poor.”

Undercounting is a real possibility, Spiegel said. “There could be scenarios where it [COVID] actually has gone through the refugee camps at a high level” but symptoms weren’t severe enough for the infected people to seek care. He added that there hasn’t been enough blood testing “to know the extent that COVID has actually been transmitted in these settings. … It takes a lot of time and money to be able to do this.”

Individual circumstances

Transmission rates ultimately may vary depending on the individual camp or other setting, said Spiegel, a former UNHCR senior official who has responded to crises in the Middle East, parts of Africa and Asia. He was on a team that, early in the pandemic, advised the United Nations, governments and humanitarian groups on best responses.

In early December, Spiegel completed five weeks of touring and assessing health conditions in Afghanistan for the World Health Organization. In that country, he said, only three of 39 facilities intended for treating COVID were functioning; the rest were devoid of supplies or paid staff following the Taliban takeover in August and subsequent sanctions by the United States and other Western allies. Last week, the U.S. Treasury Department said it would lift restrictions on some humanitarian aid.

On behalf of UNHCR, Spiegel also is looking at COVID’s impact on two Syrian refugee camps in Jordan: Za’atari, a northern site with nearly 80,000 residents, and Azraq, a northeastern site hosting 38,000. Preliminary data indicate lower rates of infection and death in those two camps than among residents of surrounding areas, he said.

“So why would that be? We have some hypotheses,” Spiegel said, noting that those camps went into lockdown early, restricting refugees to the camp, limiting outsiders’ access, and promoting more handwashing and social distancing. Local and international NGOs sustained their support for the camps, he said, so residents could continue to access health care and food, “even if it’s not enough” to meet their caloric needs. He also noted that people in camps spend a lot of time outside.

Spiegel said he’s involved in additional studies of refugees and host communities in Bangladesh and in three African countries: Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of the Congo and Uganda. He said he anticipated their findings to be published in 2022.

Source: Voice of America

Researchers in South Africa have discovered that people who have been infected with the omicron variant of the coronavirus develop enhanced immunity to the older delta variant.

The conclusion is the result of a new study conducted at Durban-based Africa Health Research Institute involving 33 vaccinated and unvaccinated people. The scientists found that immunity against a further exposure to omicron rose 14-fold about two weeks after infection, while also discovering that immunity against delta improved 4.4-fold.

The scientists say the immunity is especially enhanced among those who are inoculated.

Alex Sigal, the study’s co-author, said on Twitter Monday that if omicron is “less pathogenic” as it appears, “then this will help push delta out,” making it possible

“the disruption Covid-19 has caused in our lives may become less.”

The study, which has not been peer reviewed, has been submitted to the medical journal MedRxiv.

An earlier study out of South Africa revealed a reduced risk of hospitalization and severe illness from omicron, compared to delta.

The omicron strain has rapidly spread around the world since it was first detected in southern Africa in November.

Source: Voice of America

CAPE TOWN — South Africa has started a week of mourning for Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu, who died Sunday at the age of 90. Cape Town’s St George’s Cathedral will toll its bells every day at noon through Friday in honor of the anti-apartheid hero before a Saturday funeral service.

The bells at St. George’s Cathedral rang out for 10-minutes on Monday. It was here that Archbishop Tutu gave refuge to many during the dark days of apartheid.

His non-violent campaign won him international recognition including the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984. He was also greatly loved by his countrymen and women. Veteran journalist Ayesha Ismail explains.

“You know as a South African and as a journalist when I think about Archbishop Desmond Tutu, I think about love, I think about justice, I think about peace and I think about compassion. Archbishop Desmond Tutu was the one who opened the doors of this cathedral when we were fighting the apartheid regime during the height of apartheid and during the state of emergency, we were teargassed, we were sjambokked and it was the archbishop who opened these doors for us to come and seek refuge. He will be deeply missed and I think I can safely say that South Africa has lost its moral compass,” said the journalist.

Once democracy was established in South Africa in 1994, Tutu continued to campaign for human rights, championing all kinds of causes around the world.

In recent years, he also spoke out against the African National Congress which is in power in South Africa. He was outraged by the unchecked corruption within the party.

Children and young people were close to his heart. He was a patron of many trusts. The CEO of one of them, Jason Falken, said even when Tutu was ill, the archbishop was in email contact with him so they could work out a plan to ensure funding came in after he passed on.

“Not only for the trust but for our beneficiaries the Tygerberg Children’s Hospital it’s been immense. You know the arch and Ma Leah their many visits to the hospital were always filled with joy and laughter and the kids really look out for that. But over and above that, the arch was also very instrumental, especially in the early years of the trust in raising significant funds specifically for the purpose of much-needed medical equipment which ran into the hundreds of thousands of rand,” he said.

The assistant priest at St. George’s Cathedral, Marcus Slingers, said it was a great privilege to have visited Tutu at his home in Milnerton, a Cape Town suburb, for about 40 minutes each day.

“We are all saddened by this great loss. The dean and I and others, you know in these last few months, had the opportunity of celebrating the eucharist with him every day and that was part of his life and I’ve just been privileged to have been part of it. And what a man of God and humble,” he said.

The archbishop’s 66-year marriage to Leah Tutu was admired by many. They had four children: Trevor, Thandeka, Naomi and Mpho. Father Marcus said on his visits to Tutu, Mrs. Tutu would tell him stories over cups of tea about how they supported each other.

“And how the two of them had just done things together. Everything that they’ve done, they’ve done together and our hearts and our prayers, our thoughts are with her and the rest of the family,” he said.

A number of events are planned for this week, including a memorial service which the South African Council of Churches will host on Wednesday.

Archbishop Tutu’s body will lie in state at St. George’s Cathedral on Friday. His funeral will take place there on Saturday.

Source: Voice of America

The Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is expressing concern at the latest wave of COVID infections as the continent enters the holiday season.Africa CDC Director John Nkengasong says they are pushing African countries to consider vaccine mandates.

Africa is seeing an increase in COVID infections, according to the figures released by the Africa CDC Thursday.

The continent recorded 253,000 positive cases over the past week, a 21% increase from the previous week and a 14% death increase.

Addressing journalists online, Africa CDC head John Nkengasong said they are concerned with the rising COVID cases.

“We continue to see this wave come and go but the very concerning element here is that the fourth wave and potentially the fifth wave is starting just before we go into the holiday season and that’s very concerning to me. Last year we saw the wave coming up after the holiday seasons and not before the holiday seasons, so we should just keep that in mind,” he said.

Since the omicron coronavirus variant was identified in South Africa last month, 22 countries have reported its presence in their communities.

More Africans are getting vaccinated, 325 million in all, but the large majority of people have not received the first jab.

Nkengasong says every country needs to launch a vaccination effort.

“We have a long way to go, at least we are making progress, we need a massive campaign, a massive campaign at every country level, so everyone should get out there especially with what we now know with new variants coming. You cannot talk of even a booster if people have not received their first doses of vaccine. Our campaign should be pushing people who have not received their first dose to receive the first dose,” he said.

Some countries like Kenya are banning unvaccinated people from accessing government services and public places, in order to push more people to get vaccinated.

Source: Voice of America

Scientists and health advocates in Africa say they’re deeply disappointed by a statement from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention about the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine.

The CDC last week recommended the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines ahead of the J&J, because of concerns the J&J shot could, in rare cases, cause blood clots, or thrombosis.

The J&J vaccine is one of the most widely used in Africa, because it’s a single dose shot that doesn’t require ultra-cold storage. The South African health department has reassured people that the Johnson & Johnson vaccine is safe.

In a statement, the CDC said it was expressing a “clinical preference” for other vaccines over J&J.

“This updated CDC recommendation follows similar recommendations from other countries, including Canada and the United Kingdom,” the CDC said. Still, the CDC said “receiving any vaccine is better than being unvaccinated.”

But health authorities in Africa say the CDC recommendation has done “irreparable” harm to their vaccination efforts. They say that the CDC’s linking of the J&J vaccine with rare, but potentially fatal, side effects will spark widespread rejection of the vaccine on the continent, where other vaccines are mostly unavailable.

Fewer than 6% of people in Africa are vaccinated and the World Health Organization describes Africa as “one of the least affected regions in the world.”

“I’ve been inundated with calls from people saying, ‘You’re poisoning us’ and ‘We don’t want to take this’ and ‘We’re getting second-hand vaccines; we shouldn’t be getting the J&J, we should only be getting the Pfizer,’” said Barry Jacobson, president of the Southern African Society of Thrombosis. “The CDC, by putting out this statement, has made people scared about taking the J&J booster, and they shouldn’t be.”

South Africa’s top epidemiologist, Salim Abdool Karim, maintains J&J’s vaccine is safe.

“If you had to just look at, for example, thrombosis from cases of COVID-19, it’s far higher than from what we see from the vaccine,” said Karim, an epidemiologist at South Africa’s University of KwaZulu-Natal, who previously advised the South African government on COVID-19. “So there’s no question that this vaccine has a net benefit, even in the face of these side effects.”

The CDC recommendation followed the occurrence of a rare and sometimes fatal blood-clotting issue, called thrombosis with thrombocytopenia syndrome, or TTS, that specifically affected the brain, in people who got the J&J vaccine.

“We’ve seen thrombosis occurring with all the vaccines,” Jacobson said. “But the fact of the matter is, if one gets COVID, the risk of thrombosis is massive. It’s a much greater risk of dying of thrombosis from getting COVID than from being vaccinated and getting a thrombosis, where the risk is miniscule compared to the other group.”

Jacobson was on the safety committee that oversaw one of the world’s biggest vaccine trials, when half-a-million health workers in South Africa received the J&J vaccine earlier this year.

That trial, called Sisonke, came to a temporary halt in April when the CDC paused use of the vaccine after six cases of TTS in the U.S. After analyzing more data, the CDC gave the green light to the shot, saying its benefits outweighed its risks.

Why the CDC would now, “out of the blue,” again link the J&J vaccine with this type of thrombosis, Jacobson said, is beyond him.

“The fact that the CDC came out and said that, it shows no insight into what we face in Africa, where there’s a problem with cold-chain storage and the fact that patients can’t get to more than one vaccine,” Jacobson said. “If you look at the true incidence, it’s one in 500,000 to one in a million. You have a higher chance of being struck by lightning.”

Source: Voice of America