Canada
Approves Moderna / NIH vaccine
Order, 40 million doses
Pfizer already rolling out
France
Approved Pfizer BioNTec vaccine
All ages over 16
Distribution Sunday, first jabs Monday, 28th December
UK
Between 8 and 20 December, 521,594 jabs
Over 80s, 366,715, 70%
Health and care staff
US
115 million traveling
South Africa variant
Christmas parties, super spreader events
N501Y, 501.V2
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-55428953
UK, two cases
In London and north west England, Tuesday
Travel restrictions now imposed
Jo burg to LHR landed, 07.19 today (Thursday)
Horses and stable doors
SA to Singapore or Doha, or China, or Amsterdam or Paris today
Anyone from SA or contacts, quarantine immediately
Dr. Zweli Mkhize, SA health minister
SA has sequenced hundreds of genomes since the start of the pandemic
young, previously healthy people are now becoming very sick
cannot go through what we went through in the early days of the Aids pandemic
This genomics team, led by the Kwazulu-Natal Research Innovation and Sequencing Platform, or KRISP, has sequenced hundreds of samples from across the country since the beginning of the pandemic in March. #SARSCOV2MediaBriefing
— Zweli Mkhize (@DrZweliMkhize) December 18, 2020
Prof Neil Ferguson, Imperial College London
I think the greatest concern of ours at the moment is the South African one
There’s certainly anecdotal reports of explosive outbreaks for that virus and very steep increases in case numbers
Mr Hancock
New variant was highly concerning
Anyone told to quarantine must avoid all contact with any other person whatsoever
Prof Lawrence Young, Warwick Medical School
The move to harsher levels of restriction across the country is inevitable
Alan Winde, Western Cape
Hospitals in the province under severe strain
More Covid-19 cases than during the first wave
2020 12
Estimated transmissibility and severity of novel SARS-CoV-2 Variant of Concern 202012/01 in England
Centre for Mathematical Modelling of Infectious Diseases London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine
https://cmmid.github.io/topics/covid19/reports/uk-novel-variant/2020_12_23_Transmissibility_and_severity_of_VOC_202012_01_in_England.pdf
Appears to be rapidly spreading towards fixation
VOC 202012/01 is 56% more transmissible
95% credible interval across three regions 50-74%
No clear evidence for greater or lesser severity of disease
Increase in transmissibility, a large increase in incidence
COVID-19 hospitalisations and deaths projected to reach higher levels in 2021 than were observed in 2020
Even if regional tiered restrictions implemented before 19 December are maintained
Unless primary schools, secondary schools, and universities are also closed
Large resurgences of the virus are likely to occur following easing of control measures
Greatly accelerate vaccine roll-out to have an appreciable impact in suppressing the resulting disease burden
UK
China bans flights from the UK
Cases, + 39, 237 = 2,149,551
https://covid.joinzoe.com/data#levels-over-time
https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/cases
Record daily number
Londoners, prevalence = 2%
London, mostly new variant
Deaths, + 744 = 69,051
Deaths, = 79,349
Regions
https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/interactive-map
Mr Hancock
Six million more people in the east and south east of England, to enter tier four on Boxing Day
Cornwall and Herefordshire up to tier two
Scotland and NI start new lockdowns on Boxing Day.
Old tiering system was not enough to control the new variant
Cases up 57% in past 7 days
Hospital admissions, highest since mid-April
East Anglia had seen a “significant number” of cases caused by the new fast-spreading variant
ONS, 12 to 18 December 2020
Continued increase in positivity rates
England
Prevalence = 645,800
One in 85 people.
Wales
One in 60 people
Northern Ireland
Up to 1 in 180 people
Scotland
Down to 1 in 140
Rates increased sharply in London, the East of England and the South East.
BBC comes good
hands, space, face, replace
Russia
Cases, + 29,935
Deaths, + 635
Download my two educational text books for free using this link: http://159.69.48.3
Hard copy of the Physiology Notes text book on ebay, https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/-/15402036…
Hard copy of the Pathophysiology text book on e bay, https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/154260052745
John’s research on text book efficacy, https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/2158244015612517
Source