The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released a centralized school reopening plan on Friday that includes safety and mitigation practices, such as physical detachment and masking, as well as the use of new measures, such as “podding” “.
Podding includes keeping the same students together (as in a pod) to reduce students’ possible exposure to the virus. But questions about access to critical resources, like better ventilation, tests and masks, remain unanswered. During a press conference on Friday, CDC officials said the burden fell on Congress to approve funds to achieve such measures.
The Biden government has said it will prioritize education and the return of students and teachers to schools with security and equality.
Other industries are also working to find ways to start operating at pre-pandemic levels. The airline industry, one of the hardest hit by the pandemic, recently saw a test mandate for international flights, although the U.S. government is also evaluating test mandates for domestic flights. The aviation industry, however, is counterattacking, saying that this unfairly places the burden of testing on airlines and will negatively affect their bottom line.
In a letter to the White House COVID-19 Response Team seen by Yahoo Finance, Boeing said the onus should be on the federal government to fund such tests.
But Michael Mina, a testing expert and an assistant professor of epidemiology at Harvard University, said that even current international testing requirements are largely futile.
“The pre-flight test with three to five days before flying … is not effective,” Mina told Yahoo Finance.
In fact, getting the results of these tests may not capture your current health status, said Mina. That’s why he continued to push for cheap and fast antigen tests, instead of the more laborious, but accurate, PCR tests to be performed at the gate before takeoff.
“The point is that we need the test, if it is going to be effective, we need to be very close to the event,” said Mina.
More doses of vaccine
The US has agreed to purchase a total of 200 million additional doses, 100 million each from Pfizer (PFE) and (MRNA), bringing the US total to 600 million doses from the only two authorized companies.
While this helps to cover the majority of the population in the United States, it is not enough for everyone, as both vaccines require two doses. Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) is probably the next vaccine to be made available to Americans, with an authorization potentially coming later this month.
President Joe Biden announced his intention to buy additional doses on January 26, and White House officials noted that the current batch of 200 million doses per company is expected to reach the end of the second quarter.
Pfizer’s vaccine, developed with BioNTech (BNTX), is being sold to the United States for the same price previously announced, or about $ 1.95 billion for the 100 million doses.
Moderna did not disclose its price, but noted that the company has delivered 41 million doses to date. Its commitment to the USA is almost double that of the European Union. The federal government has committed up to $ 5.75 billion to date to develop, manufacture and purchase Moderna’s vaccine.
To date, more than 68 million doses have been sent and more than 46 million have been administered in first and second doses, according to the CDC.
Meanwhile, leading health officials are concerned about the increased spread of coronavirus variants. UK variant B.1.1.7 is becoming the dominant strain in the United States, with more than 981 cases reported in 37 states. Fewer cases have been reported for strain B.1.351, from South Africa, and strain P.1, from Brazil, but experts believe they are also spreading.
In an article in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and colleagues at the National Institute of Health, emphasized the need to control the pandemic before being even more so. strains appear that can make vaccines ineffective.
“It is not clear whether changes in vaccine composition will be needed to effectively control the COVID-19 pandemic; however, it is prudent to be prepared. Some companies have indicated plans to manufacture and test vaccines based on emerging variants, and such studies will provide information important information about the potential to increase the immune response “, wrote the authors.
Dr. Paul Offit, a leading vaccine specialist and pediatrician at Children’s Hospital of Pennsylvania (CHOP), said on Thursday that the group of experts who met to develop a coordinated research strategy for therapies and vaccines met again due to the concern about variants.
“We actually thought we were done, but with the variants coming up now, we will meet again,” said Offit during an interview with JAMA on Thursday.
Although vaccines appear to resist serious illnesses now, Offit worries about September this year, where the weather will get colder again and a new variant may emerge.
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