Tag: Corona

Single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine applauded by DeSantis

Single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine applauded by DeSantis 1
On Wednesday, Governor Ron DeSantis hailed the Food and Drug Administration recently as they released a review of the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine. If authorized, it will become the first single-dose COVID-19 vaccine in the United States, providing a much-needed shot-in-the-arm to the nation’s vaccine distribution effort.

“That is a huge, huge win,” DeSantis said, flanked by Senate President Wilton Simpson and Rep. Blaise Ingogliaat a vaccination site in Brooksville.

A review was released on Wednesday in which the health officials say that the single-jab vaccine nearly eliminates the risk of COVID-19-related mortality and hospitalization.

The vaccine does, however, have its disadvantages. 

While health officials noted that the vaccine is more than 85% effective at preventing severe illness, the single-shot dose proved only 66% effective at blocking infection. 

“Only only “mild cases” developed in patients who received the Johnson & Johnson vaccine,” said DeSantis.

“No one wants to get infected with anything, but if you get infected and it’s mild and you move on, that’s a win given that this is something that can obviously be more threatening to people,” DeSantis said.

The Johnson & Johnson vaccine is expected to win emergency approval this week. The Johnson & Johnson vaccine would become the third vaccine approved in the U.S.’s arsenal if approved by regulators.

DeSantis predicted shipments to Florida might begin as early as next week, supplementing the state’s limited Pfizer and Moderna vaccine supply.

According to Reuter, Johnson & Johnson said they are positioned to distribute 4 million doses upon approval. Meanwhile, Florida is still determining how to distribute the single-dose vaccine.

Governor Ron DeSantis suggested the vaccine may be placed in doctors’ offices and pharmacies. He also noted that Johnson & Johnson doesn’t require the stringent storage requirements demanded by Pfizer and Moderna doses. Moreover, Governor DeSantis said vaccines will remain optional for Floridians.

“We know 100% are not going to opt for it and that’s fine. There’s no mandate,” DeSantis said. “It’s there for you. We’re going to work to make sure people who want to get it (can).”

Florida’s vaccine rollout has prioritized the elderly and those at high-risk for contraction, such as health workers.

As of Wednesday, health officials have administered more than 4.1 million vaccine doses in Florida.

Emotional White House Ceremony marking 500,000 COVID deaths

Emotional White House Ceremony marking 500,000 COVID deaths 2

Emotional President Job Biden and Vice President Harris had asked America to “resist becoming numb to the sorrow” on Monday. He said that the novel coronavirus had inflicted by acknowledging the deeply shocking milestone of more than 500,000 Americans dead from the pandemic in a solemn ceremony at the White House.

The country passed the grim toll at 5 pm and bells began tolling at the National Cathedral, resounding across a capital with flags lowered to half-staff. About an hour later, President Biden and Harris, along with first lady Jill Biden and second gentleman Doug Emhoff, emerged from the White House at sundown.

President Biden appeared in the Cross Hall of the White House and pulled a card from his jacket pocket that he said was updated each day with the number of those infected with the coronavirus and those who died of Covid-19. The foot of the South Portico was covered in 500 candles honoring the dead. They listened to a Marine Corps band play “Amazing Grace” as they held a moment of silence.

“We have to resist viewing each life as a statistic or a blur,” he said Monday, in the second ceremony he has held to honor people killed in the ongoing pandemic. President Joe Biden sought not only to honor the dead but also to comfort those who have lost loved ones, many of whom “took their final breath alone.”

“To heal, we must remember. It’s hard, sometimes, to remember,” Biden said on the eve of his inauguration in a similar ceremony at the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. At that time, the U.S. had just marked 400,000 COVID-19 deaths. Remembering, he said, is “how we heal. It’s important to do that as a nation.”

“I know all too well,” he said. “I know what it’s like to not be there when it happens. I know what it’s like when you are there holding their hands; there’s a look in their eye and they slip away. That black hole in your chest — you feel like you’re being sucked into it. The survivor’s remorse, the anger, the questions of faith in your soul.”

The President addressed the survivors directly, alluding several times to the loss of his first wife, an infant daughter, and, later, his eldest son

“I promise you,” Biden said Monday night, as he often does when delivering eulogies and marking deaths, “the day will come when the memory of the loved one you lost will bring a smile to your lips before a tear to your eye. It will come, I promise you.”

He also said that it was a strikingly emotional moment, and a testament to a nation’s failure to act in the face of a calamity that would take the lives of more Americans in a year’s time than those who died in World War I, World War II and the Vietnam War combined. “More lives lost to this virus,” he said, “than any other nation on Earth.”

The White House ceremony was particularly notable because President Donald J. Trump refused to mark the losses or hold such remembrances, knowing that any focus on the individual lives lost would quickly raise the question of how the government failed to respond more quickly and aggressively.

Biden seeks to stabilize on the pandemic at home and abroad

Biden seeks to stabilize on the pandemic at home and abroad 3

On Friday, President Joe Biden announced to world leaders that “American is back”. He promised that he would position the country to take a distinguished part in the global fight against the Covid-19 pandemic. “We are going to beat this!” he said hours before touring a vaccine manufacturing plant in Michigan. This was one of his official trips outside Washington.

President Joe Biden further communicated the seriousness of the current crisis and his willingness to fight and defeat it by investing in science and infrastructure both at home and abroad.

“We are not looking backward. We are looking forward together,” Biden said during a virtual appearance at the Munich Security Conference where he noted that the US was officially rejoining the Paris climate accord pledging 2 Billion dollars to a global coronavirus vaccine initiative to help further the development of vaccines as the US tries to “earn back our position of trusted leadership.”
The stature of the US was dropped off around the world for the four years under Donald Trump.
 His erratic behaviour and anti-science pronouncements were watched by many longtime allies in disbelief.
When the Ebola outbreak had occurred, President Barack Obama had lead America as he referred to it as a national security priority while Donald Trump withdrew from that traditional posture as the coronavirus spread rapidly across the world, therefore, failing to marshal a coordinated national response. During Donald Trump’s presidency, the US governors were forced to fend for themselves, despite his administration launching an effort to accelerate vaccine development and production.
Almost a month after President Joe Biden has taken over the office, he has had his fair share of messaging blunders. From shifting timelines on vaccinations, when and how schools can reopen to when life can return to normal generally – however, he made it clear on Friday that he is looking forward to making a sharp break from former president Donald Trump’s muddled, go-it-alone approach. President Joe Biden is looking forward to strengthening America’s partnerships as the US tackles challenges like the climate crisis and future pandemics alongside like-minded allies.
“Even as we fight to get out of the teeth of this pandemic, the resurgence of Ebola in Africa is a stark reminder that we must simultaneously work to finally finance health security; strengthen global health systems; and create early warning systems to prevent, detect, and respond to future biological threats, because they will keep coming,” Biden told the Munich Security Conference, hours after he’d participated in his first virtual session of the G7.