With the already staggering coronavirus case and death toll expected to climb further in the US following Thanksgiving, there’s at least more good news on the vaccine front. The biotech firm Moderna released the final results of its 30,000-person vaccine trial in a press release Monday, reporting a 94.1 percent rate of efficacy. The finding squares with the 94.5 percent efficacy rate the company reported two weeks ago, based on its first interim analysis of trial data.

Of the 196 Covid-19 cases in the trial, 185 were in the placebo group and only 11 in the vaccine group, Moderna reported.

Even more important, the vaccine — called mRNA-1273 — appears to protect against severe disease, not just asymptomatic or mild cases. Of the 30 severe Covid-19 cases among trial participants, all occurred in the placebo group. If the finding is real, it would likely mean averted deaths and hospitalizations when millions of people are immunized.

“You’ve got 100 percent protection against severe disease,” Paul Offit, an infectious disease and vaccine researcher at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, told Vox. “That’s remarkable.”

“If these numbers are right, it’s more than we’d need for the vaccine to be a major control measure for this outbreak,” said Eric Rubin, an infectious disease specialist and the editor-in-chief of the New England Journal of Medicine.

Given that the Pfizer/BioNTech and AstraZeneca/Oxford coronavirus vaccine research groups have also put out promising findings recently, this latest announcement of final data from the Moderna trial reaffirms that the world will likely have several highly effective vaccines for Covid-19 — and the end of the pandemic may be on the horizon. High efficacy also means that fewer people would need to be vaccinated in order to achieve herd immunity, the threshold at which the virus can no longer spread easily from person to person.

https://www.vox.com/2020/11/30/21726327/moderna-covid-19-vaccine-results

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Continuing the spate of stunning news about COVID-19 vaccines, the biotech company Moderna announced the final results of the 30,000-person efficacy trial for its candidate in a press release today: Only 11 people who received two doses of the vaccine developed COVID-19 symptoms after being infected with the pandemic coronavirus, versus 185 symptomatic cases in a placebo group. That is an efficacy of 94.1%, the company says, far above what many vaccine scientists were expecting just a few weeks ago.

More impressive still, Moderna’s candidate had 100% efficacy against severe disease. There were zero such COVID-19 cases among those vaccinated, but 30 in the placebo group. The company today plans to file a request for emergency use authorization (EUA) for its vaccine with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and is also seeking a similar green light from the European Medicines Agency.

The data released today bolster an interim report from the company two weeks ago that only analyzed 95 total cases but produced similarly impressive efficacy. “I would still like to see all of the actual data, but what we’ve seen so far is absolutely remarkable,” says Paul Offit, a vaccine researcher at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia who is a member of an independent committee of vaccine experts that advises FDA.

Moderna’s vaccine against SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, relies on a novel technology that uses messenger RNA (mRNA) to code for a protein called spike that studs the surface of the pathogen. Pfizer and BioNTech have developed a similar mRNA vaccine against COVID-19 and also reported excellent results, with an efficacy of 95%, in the final analysis of their 45,000-person trial. In that study, which ended after 170 cases of COVID-19 were identified, only 10 severe cases occurred, and just one was in the vaccinated group.

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/11/absolutely-remarkable-no-one-who-got-modernas-vaccine-trial-developed-severe-covid-19

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Cases of coronavirus in England fell 30% after lockdown measures were rolled out in November, according to a study by Imperial College London and Ipsos MORI U.K. Ltd.

The findings show cases were rising as the country entered a four-week lockdown on Nov. 5 and that a sharp decrease followed as national restrictions were rolled out, according to the report published on Monday.

The study supports findings “that stronger measures would be needed in some areas to prevent the epidemic from growing and that local tiers needed to be toughened to keep the virus under control once national measures end this week,” the report said.

The results come as lockdown measures in England are due to end this week and Prime Minister Boris Johnson is facing opposition from some in his Conservative Party to his plan to replace the lockdown with a tiered system of restrictions for different areas. Hopes are that a vaccine can be administered quickly, beginning as soon as next month.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-11-30/england-lockdown-cuts-virus-cases-30-study-shows

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Britain has secured two million doses of Moderna Inc's COVID-19 vaccine candidate, to be available in Europe as early as the spring, the government said on Sunday, in addition to the 5 million doses it secured from the U.S. company two weeks ago.

The new deal came a day after Prime Minister Boris Johnson named Nadhim Zahawi, a junior business minister, to be minister responsible for the deployment of COVID-19 vaccines.

Britain now has access to enough doses of Moderna's vaccine candidate for around 3.5 million people. Overall, it has access to 357 million doses of vaccines from seven developers, according to government statement.

"With a wide range of vaccine candidates in our portfolio, we stand ready to deploy a vaccine should they receive approval from our medicines regulator, starting with those who will benefit most," health minister Matt Hancock said in the statement.

https://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/uk-secures-2m-more-doses-of-modernas-covid-19-vaccine

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Health officials have presented Denmark's plan to roll out vaccinations against Covid-19.

People in risk groups for serious illness with the virus will be given first priority once a coronavirus vaccination is available, officials confirmed.

The Danish Health Authority (Sundhedsstyrelsen) expects the country’s vaccination programme to commence at the beginning of 2021, with some optimism the very first vaccines could be given in December 2020, DR writes.

Those timescales are set out in a plan entitled Udrulning af vaccination mod Covid-19 (Rolling Out Vaccination Against Covid-19), published by the authority on Thursday.

According to the plan, vaccination will initially be offered to persons in specified risk groups and to selected key workers in the health, elderly and social care sectors.

No vaccine has been approved by the Danish Medicines Agency (Lægemiddelstyrelsen), but the country has pre-purchase agreements with five medical companies which are developing vaccines.

At least two candidates, from Moderna and BioNTech/Pfizer, are nearing approval stage, according to international reports.

“In the most optimistic scenario, the first vaccines will be delivered to Denmark at the end of this year,” health minister Magnus Heunicke said at a press briefing on Thursday evening.

https://www.thelocal.dk/20201127/denmark-presents-covid-19-vaccination-plan-first-vaccines-could-be-offered-in-december

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Belgium has adapted its current lockdown measures to curb the spread of the coronavirus during the end-of-year period, Prime Minister Alexander De Croo announced during a press conference on Friday.

“The situation in our country is better than a few weeks ago,” De Croo said. “We have managed to reverse a very dangerous trend. However, it is now a question of persevering, and continuing the efforts of the last four weeks.”

“Even if the situation is less dramatic now, it is still very dangerous. We are still in alert phase 4, according to the latest data,” he added. “The circulation of the virus is still too widespread.”

“If we are not careful now, we are putting all of these efforts at risk,” De Croo said. “That is why we have decided to remain cautious, especially now, with the approaching winter months.”

All non-essential shops will be allowed to reopen from Tuesday 1 December, but everything has to happen “responsibly.” Fun-shopping is not allowed, people have to shop alone and can only stay in a shop for a maximum of 30 minutes. The basic rules have to be respected at all times.

https://www.brusselstimes.com/belgium/142922/consultative-committee-lockdown-alexander-de-croo-non-essential-shops-hairdressers-christmas-new-year-frank-vandenbroucke-curfew-cuddle-contact/

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The UK is poised to become the first western country to approve a Covid-19 vaccine, with the independent regulator set to grant approval within days.

Deliveries of the vaccine developed by BioNTech and Pfizer would begin within hours of the authorisation, according to government officials. The first injections could take place from December 7.

The UK has ordered 40m doses of the two-shot product, which preliminary data found to be more than 95 per cent effective in preventing disease.

Vaccines would normally be authorised by the European Medicines Agency until the end of the Brexit transition on December 31. However the UK’s Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency has the power to temporarily authorise products, in cases of urgent public need.

The same process could be applied to the vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford university. On Friday, the government wrote to the regulator, asking it to review the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine.

https://www.ft.com/content/ebd9ca50-c2d7-4b0e-afd5-e90e93c0c495

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Adar Poonawalla, CEO of the Serum Institute of India, has said his company is ready to "push the button" to make 100 million doses of the Oxford/AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine a month in the country.

He told BBC World News: "We have targeted about a billion doses by the end of 2021. In fact we have already made about 40 million doses in India and stockpiled it."

Mr Poonawalla hoped they would be producing 100 million doses a month by January or February after full regulatory approval.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/world-asia-india-55091890

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The Italian government will ease anti-COVID restrictions in five regions from Sunday, including in the country’s richest and most populous region Lombardy, the Health Ministry said.

Lombardy, Piedmont and Calabria will be downgraded from red to orange zones, while Sicily and Liguria will drop from the orange to the yellow zone, which has least restrictions.

Friday’s decision follows a gradual decline in hospitalisations from coronavirus in much of Italy over the past week, with the number of new cases also retreating from highs seen earlier this month.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-italy-regions-idUSKBN2872C6

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U.S. President Donald Trump said on Thursday that delivery of the coronavirus vaccine would begin next week and the week after.

Speaking to U.S. troops overseas via video link to mark the Thanksgiving holiday, Trump said the vaccine would initially be send to front-line workers, medical personnel and senior citizens.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-trump/trump-says-coronavirus-vaccine-deliveries-to-begin-next-week-idUSKBN2862GY

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