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Germany Offers Patients Alternatives For AstraZeneca, J&J Jabs Due To Blood-Clot Risks

Germany Offers Patients Alternatives For AstraZeneca, J&J Jabs Due To Blood-Clot Risks

In the latest blow to AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine, intended to be the "workhorse" of the international vaccine rollout organized by Covax, the badly

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Germany Offers Patients Alternatives For AstraZeneca, J&J Jabs Due To Blood-Clot Risks

In the latest blow to AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine, intended to be the "workhorse" of the international vaccine rollout organized by Covax, the badly underfunded WHO program to "vaccinate the world", the German government is reportedly planning to offer patients under 40 an alternative to the AstraZeneca vaccine.

Younger patients are believed to be at higher risk for rare but potentially deadly cerebral blood clots sometimes observed in patients with low blood-platelet counts as a reaction to the vaccine. Some researchers have pointed to issues with the adenovirus platform, which was also used by J&J in developing its vaccine. That jab has also seen issues with blood clots. 

In order to encourage more people to get vaccinated in a country where vaccine skepticism is more pronounced, the Independent reports that the policy, which currently applies to patients under 30, will be expanded.

This comes after the British government reported new figures on blood clot risk.

A senior government source insisted that the change would not impact the UK’s target of offering a first vaccine dose to every adult by the end of July, because of the availability of supplies provided by Pfizer and Moderna.

The source said that the precautionary decision to offer an alternative jab to the under-40s was also driven by the “flexibility” of the vaccination rollout and Britain’s falling Covid-19 infection rates, which mean that, on balance, the risk posed by the blood clots is now greater in younger age groups.

Additionally, Der Spiegel reported Friday that Germany plans to recommend J&J's vaccine only for patients above 60, most of whom have already been vaccinated. Circling back to Germany's plans to offer alternatives for the AstraZeneca jab, the Independent said a statement has been drafted by the JCVI offering recommendations, but not policy, to the government. An announcement is set to be made on Friday. No new safety concerns surrounding the vaccine have been raised.

"Because prevalence of Covid is low, and given the strength of the program, that means we’re in a position to act with an abundance of caution and offer a different vaccine to the younger groups," the source said.

The latest data from the MHRA shows that, up to 28 April, there had been 242 cases of the rare clotting disorder following vaccination using the AstraZeneca jab, with more than 28MM doses administered to date.

Some 24 cases were reported in people aged 18 to 29, 31 for patients in their 30s, and 38 for patients in their 40s, 68 in people in their 50s and 67 in those aged 60 and above. The age of patients from the remaining cases isn't known.

More than one-fifth of the rare blood clots were in people aged under 40, and two-thirds in those under 60.

However, for people in their twenties, the risk of hospitalization from COVID is similar to the risk of harm posed by the vaccine - a factor that drove the JCVI to introduce the initial policy

While "the benefits of the vaccine continue to outweigh the risks for most people", as one official told the Independent, it makes sense for younger patients to try and minimize risks from potentially deadly side effects, since the risks to their health from the virus simply aren't that prominent.

Tyler Durden Sat, 05/08/2021 - 07:35

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Raining cats and dogs: research finds global precipitation patterns a driver for animal diversity

Since the HMS Beagle arrived in the Galapagos with Charles Darwin to meet a fateful family of finches, ecologists have struggled to understand a particularly…

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Since the HMS Beagle arrived in the Galapagos with Charles Darwin to meet a fateful family of finches, ecologists have struggled to understand a particularly perplexing question: Why is there a ridiculous abundance of species some places on earth and a scarcity in others? What factors, exactly, drive animal diversity?

Credit: Wikimedia

Since the HMS Beagle arrived in the Galapagos with Charles Darwin to meet a fateful family of finches, ecologists have struggled to understand a particularly perplexing question: Why is there a ridiculous abundance of species some places on earth and a scarcity in others? What factors, exactly, drive animal diversity?

With access to a mammoth set of global-scale climate data and a novel strategy, a team from the Department of Watershed Sciences in Quinney College of Natural Resources and the Ecology Center identified several factors to help answer this fundamental ecological question. They discovered that what an animal eats (and how that interacts with climate) shapes Earth’s diversity.

The work was recently published in the high-impact journal Ecology Letters.

“Historically studies looking at the distribution of species across Earth’s latitudinal gradient have overlooked the role of trophic ecology — how what animals eat impacts where they are found,” said Trisha Atwood, author on the study from the Department of Watershed Sciences and the Ecology Center. “This new work shows that predators, omnivores and herbivores are not randomly scattered across the globe. There are patterns to where we find these groups of animals.”

Certain locations have an unexpected abundance of meat-eating predators — parts of Africa, Europe and Greenland. Herbivores are common in cooler areas, and omnivores tend to be more dominant in warm places. Two key factors emerged as crucial in shaping these patterns: precipitation and plant growth.

Precipitation patterns across time play a big role in determining where different groups of mammals thrive, Atwood said. Geographical areas where precipitation varies by season, without being too extreme, had the highest levels of mammal diversity.

“Keep in mind that we aren’t talking about the total amount of rain,” said Jaron Adkins, lead author on the research. “If you imagine ecosystems around the world on a scale of precipitation and season, certain places in Utah and the Amazon rainforest fall on one end with low variability — they have steady levels of precipitation throughout the year. Other regions, like southern California, have really high variability, getting about 75 percent of the annual precipitation between December and March.”

But the sweet spot for predators and herbivores fell in a middle zone between the two extremes, he said. Places like Madagascar, where precipitation patterns had an equal split between a wet season and a dry one (six months each), had the ideal ecological cocktail for promoting conditions for these two groups. Omnivore diversity tends to thrive in places with very stable climates.

The second important factor connected with mammal diversity the work uncovered was a measure of the amount of plant growth in an area, measured as “gross primary productivity.”

“It makes intuitive sense for plant-eating animals to benefit from plant growth,” Adkins said.

But this measure actually impacted carnivores most, according to the research. The strong relationship between predators and plant growth highlights the importance of an abundance of plants on an entire food chain’s structural integrity.

“It was surprising that this factor was more important for predators than omnivores and herbivores,” Atwood said. “Why this is remains a mystery.”

Although evolutionary processes are ultimately responsible for spurring differences in species, climate conditions can impact related factors — rates of evolutionary change, extinction and animal dispersal — influencing species and trait-based richness, according to the research.

Animal diversity is rapidly declining in many ecosystems around the world through habitat loss and climate change. This has negative consequences for ecosystems. Forecasting how climate change will disrupt animal systems going forward is extremely important, Atwood said, and this research is a first step in better managing future conditions for animals around the world.

“Animal diversity can act as an alarm system for the stability of ecosystems,” Atwood said. “Identifying the ecological mechanisms that help drive richness patterns provides insight for better managing and predicting how diversity could change under future climates.”

In addition to Adkins and Atwood, the research included seven authors currently or previously associated with the Department of Watershed Sciences and the Ecology Center: Edd Hammill, Umarfarooq Abdulwahab, John Draper, Marshall Wolf, Catherine McClure, Adrián González Ortiz and Emily Chavez.

 


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U.S. National Pension System Ranks 22nd Out Of 47 Countries; Canada Ranks 12th

The three highest-ranking countries on the list for retirees are the Netherlands (85.0), Iceland (83.5) and Denmark (81.3). Australia came in fifth (77.3),…

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The U.S. may be the richest country in the world, but its retirement system sure doesn’t show it. Once again, the United States earns an embarrassingly low overall score (63.0), ranking No. 22 out of 47 national pension systems, covering 64% of the world’s population according to Mercer’s retirement research. The three highest-ranking countries on the list for retirees are the Netherlands (85.0), Iceland (83.5) and Denmark (81.3). Australia came in fifth (77.3), the UK 10th (73.0) and Canada 12th (70.2). Argentina had the lowest index value (42.3). The information for this original article by Lorimer Wilson, Managing Editor of munKNEE.com – Your KEY To Making Money! – was sourced from an article by Pete Grieve and Julia Glum. The United States now lands outside the top 20 countries in a new ranking of 47 national pension systems in the 2023 edition of the Mercer CFA Institute Global Pension Index, which analyzes countries based on more than 50 indicators in three categories: adequacy, sustainability and integrity.

The U.S. scored its highest rank (16th) in the sustainability category, which measures the likelihood of a country’s pension system being able to provide strong benefits in the future. This sub-index includes contribution rates, coverage of the private pension system and government debt, among other factors. The U.S. ranked 24th in the adequacy category which judges the extent to which pension systems provide sufficient retirement income. This category includes taxation incentives and vesting rules for retirement income programs. The integrity sub-index is about the regulation of retirement income programs, especially private-sector pensions and the laws that govern them and the U.S. ranks 41st here. The report provides several recommendations it says could help the U.S. increase its scores, including improving retirement income for lower-income people and limiting access to funds before retirement.

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Revenge travel is coming to an end, says industry CEO — a recession will replace it

The CEO of Intercontinental Hotels Group says that the world has moved beyond revenge travel–even China.

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Maybe revenge isn't so sweet anymore. Not so long ago the term "revenge travel" was making the rounds. The idea was that people were so fed up with the covid-19 pandemic lockdown that they packed their bags and took off for just about anywhere once travel restrictions started to ease.

Related: Delta adds a route U.S. tourists have been begging for

Last year, travel insurance company Allianz Partners projected that travel to Europe would soar 600% over 2021. “The pandemic made people realize you can't take travel for granted and many Americans are eager to visit Europe this summer,” Daniel Durazo, director of external communications at Allianz Partners USA, said in an April 2022 statement.

'Last stage of pent-up demand'

The Summer of '23 was also pretty strong, according to a survey by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, which found that almost a third, or 32.8%, of all U.S. households took a vacation between May and August, up from 28.5% in August 2022 and a record high in data going back to 2015. However, it looks like the revenge travel upswing is coming to an end. The Federal Reserve's Beige Book said in September that consumer spending on tourism was stronger than expected, "surging during what most contacts considered the last stage of pent-up demand for leisure travel from the pandemic era." Elie Maalouf also thinks that the revenge travel dish has gone cold. The CEO of Intercontinental Hotels Group  (IHG) - Get Free Report said in an interview with CNBC that he believes pent-up demand is over. "People started traveling really by the end of 2020 as restrictions started to lift,” he said. “So we’re really past revenge travel — even in China.” Intercontinental Hotel Group operates hotels under several brand names, including Regent, Crowne Plaza, Holiday Inn Club Vacations, and Candlewood Suites. The company’s latest quarterly update showed travel demand remained strong during the close of the summer travel season. “We think we’re in a sustainable place,” Maalouf said. “Our bookings for groups and meetings going into 2024 and beyond are the strongest we’ve seen in a very long time.”

Average room rates increase

IHG’s third quarter trading update showed the company’s revenue per available room — or “revpar” — was up 10.5% compared to third quarter 2022, and nearly 13% higher compared with the third quarter of 2019, which was before the pandemic. This is despite a 3% drop in revpar, compared to 2019, in large cities in Greater China, which are more dependent on international travelers. Maalouf said that lack of “airlift,” or flight capacity, into China is below 50% of prepandemic levels, which is affecting travel recovery in cities like Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen. “But if you look at the country as a whole, travel — which is mostly domestic in China — it’s recovered well above 2019,” he said, adding that more than 80% of IHG’s business in China is in mid-sized to smaller cities. Occupancy levels in the third quarter at IHG hotels was 72% — just 1% shy of pre-pandemic levels, according to the quarterly update. But average room rates have jumped well above 2019 levels — up nearly 6% in Greater China, 15% in the Americas, and 24% in Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) and Asia. But rising rates are barely keeping up with inflation, said Maalouf. “Room rates have not really exceeded inflation in any of our markets,” he said. “I think people’s willingness to travel is exhibited by the fact they’re willing to pay.” Get investment guidance from trusted portfolio managers without the management fees. Sign up for Action Alerts PLUS now.

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