Ireland to inoculate children against Covid after expert recommendation
Ireland is set to open its vaccination programme to those aged 12 to 15 after its national immunisation advisory committee made a favourable recommendation.
The minister for health, Stephen Donnelly, was quoted as saying by RTE:
Yesterday, I announced that the vaccine registration portal was opening to all those aged 16 and 17 years old and today’s announcement is an important step in offering that same protection to our younger population.
Support for parents and young people will be made available to help them make the best decision for them ... We’ll make clear information for parents available in the coming days and announce soon when registration can begin.”
Minister for foreign affairs, Simon Coveney, said the decision meant “the benefit of vaccination can be extended to this much younger cohort” but that parents would retain the right to decide how to proceed.
He said that more than 83% of the Irish population have been inoculated with a first dose of a vaccine and over 70% have both jabs. According to RTE, Coveney added that once 80% of the population were fully vaccinated “you are in a very strong space” to develop herd immunity.
The European Medicine’s Agency has approved use of the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines for children.
But the UK has stopped short of rolling out the jabs to children. Prof Calum Semple, a member of the government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage), said last month: “The risk of death [from Covid in children] is one in a million. That’s not a figure and plucking from the air, that’s a quantifiable risk.”
Prof Robert Dingwall, a sociologist on the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, has meanwhile said that “it is not immoral to think that [children] may be better protected by natural immunity generated through infection than by asking them to take the possible risk of a vaccine”.
Saudi Arabia will impose a three-year travel ban on citizens travelling to countries on the kingdom’s “red list” under draconian new measures, state news agency SPA has said.
Reuters reports that it cited an unnamed interior ministry official as saying some Saudi citizens, who in May were allowed to travel abroad without prior permission from authorities for the first time since March 2020, had violated travel regulations.
“Anyone who is proven to be involved will be subject to legal accountability and heavy penalties upon their return, and will be banned from travel for three years,” the official said.
Saudi Arabia has banned travel to or transit at a number of countries including Afghanistan, Argentina, Brazil, Egypt, Ethiopia, India, Indonesia, Lebanon, Pakistan, South Africa, Turkey, Vietnam and the United Arab Emirates.
“The ministry of interior stresses that citizens are still banned from travelling directly or via another country to these states or any other that has yet to control the pandemic or where the new strains have spread,” the official said.
The kingdom, the largest Gulf state with a population of some 30 million, today recorded 1,379 new Covid-19 infections, bringing its total to 520,774 cases and 8,189 deaths.
The UK prime minister, Boris Johnson, has said it was important that people did not draw premature conclusions about several days of better Covid case data and urged the public to remain cautious.
“I’ve noticed that obviously that we’re six days into some better figures, but it is very, very important that we don’t allow ourselves to run away with premature conclusions about this,” Johnson said. “People have got to remain very cautious and that remains the approach of the government.”
Boris Johnson cautious despite six-day fall in Covid infections – video
Responding to the number of deaths reported in the UK, the medical director at Public Health England Dr Yvonne Doyle, has said:
Rates are still high and the pandemic is not over yet, today we have recorded the highest number of deaths since March.
This is in part due to the high number of cases recorded in recent weeks. We know deaths follow when there are a high number of cases and data today highlights we are still in the third wave.
We can all help. Meeting outside is safer than inside, get two doses of the vaccine as soon as you can and isolate if you are told to by NHS Test & Trace. If you show symptoms, stay home and get a PCR test. Limiting your contacts is the best way to stop the virus spreading.
UK government data also shows that, of the 84,112,856 Covid jabs given up to 26 July, 46,653,796 were first doses; a rise of 64,585 on the previous day. Some 37,459,060 were second doses; an increase of 171,676.
UK caseload deceleration continues for a seventh day
A further 23,511 lab-confirmed Covid-19 cases have been identified in the UK, the government has said, meaning daily reported cases have fallen for a seventh day in a row.
But the UK also saw the greatest day-on-day increase in death toll since 17 March, with a further 131 people dying within 28 days of testing positive. It brings the UK’s total to 129,303.
Separate figures published by the Office for National Statistics show there have been 154,000 deaths registered in the UK where Covid-19 was mentioned on the death certificate.
Iraq has recorded its worst daily increase in infections, with 12,185 new cases, Reuters reports, citing the health ministry. That takes its total so far to 1,577,013.
It reported 71 fatalities to take its death toll to 18,418, official data published by the health ministry showed.
The daily tally of cases has been rising since marking the Muslim Eid al-Adha holiday, which traditionally includes social gatherings where infections could spread and as many Iraqis flout safety and health measures. The health ministry also said 1,480,784 people have been vaccinated so far.
The former White House press secretary Sarah Sanders has urged people in Arkansas to “pray about it” before considering whether to get what she dubbed the “Trump vaccine” against Covid-19.
Sanders is running for Arkansas governor. In an opinion piece for the Arkansas Democrat Chronicle, headlined “The reasoning behind getting vaccinated”, she mostly used her platform to criticise Democrats and Anthony Fauci, chief medical adviser to President Joe Biden.
Sanders did offer tentative encouragement for people in her state to get the coronavirus vaccine.
To anyone still considering the merits of vaccination. I leave you with this encouragement: Pray about it, discuss it with your family and your doctor. Filter out the noise and fear-mongering and condescension, and make the best, most informed decision you can that helps your family, community, and our great state be its very best.
Argentina’s government has signed a deal with US pharmaceutical company Pfizer to acquire 20 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines to be delivered this year, health minister Carla Vizzotti has said.
Reuters has the story:
The agreement comes after Argentina modified at the beginning of the month the law regulating purchases of vaccines against Covid-19 to be able to access the doses of US companies. Those companies had been reluctant to sign with the South American country under previous regulations.
“Yesterday a binding agreement was signed with the Pfizer laboratory for 20 million doses during 2021. The final agreement that remains is based on logistical issues to start the delivery schedule,” Vizzotti said.
Argentina last week sent a letter to Moscow complaining about delayed delivery of doses of the Russian Sputnik V vaccine. The opposition to centre-left president Alberto Fernandez in Argentina had criticised his administration for slow action in signing vaccine deals with US companies.
In mid-July, Argentina signed an agreement with American laboratory Moderna Inc for 20 million vaccine doses. In all, the country, with a total population of about 45 million people, has received almost 42 million doses, Vizzotti said.
The Pfizer, Moderna and Sputnik V vaccines each require two doses to be fully effective.
Russia to test mixing of AstraZeneca and Sputnik V shots
Russia’s health officials have given a go-ahead to testing a combination of the AstraZeneca coronavirus shot and the single-dose version of the domestically developed Sputnik V vaccine, according to the country’s registry of approved clinical trials.
AP has the story:
The small study, which was scheduled to start yesterday and end in March, will enroll 150 volunteers and look at the mixed regimen’s safety and capability to trigger immune response, records show. It will be conducted in five medical facilities in Moscow and St. Petersburg.
AstraZeneca developed its vaccine with Oxford University. Sputnik V was developed by the state-run Gamaleya Center in Moscow, and the Russian Direct Investment Fund bankrolled the project. Both shots use a similar technology, employing a harmless virus to deliver genetic material from the spike protein of Covid-19 into the body, which then prompts an immune response.
Russian officials introduced Sputnik V last year as a two-shot vaccine using different viruses in each dose, but they also have separately marketed the first shot as a single-dose alternative dubbed Sputnik Light.
The developers of Sputnik V proposed combining the shots to AstraZeneca in November, suggesting it could increase the effectiveness of the British vaccine. AstraZeneca announced a study to test the combination in December.
Researchers in Britain and elsewhere have been testing whether combining AstraZeneca’s vaccine with other products, including the vaccines made by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna, are safe and effective. Early results have shown that combining the AstraZeneca vaccine with the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine produces a strong immune response.
