International COVID-19 Megathread

[Tender Branson]

Austrian scientists have developed a drug that successfully cures Coronavirus without the need of vaccination:

Privately-held Austrian biotech APEIRON Biologics has announced that first, encouraging data with its clinical drug candidate APN01 (rhsACE2) to treat severe COVID-19 has been published in The Lancet Respiratory Medicine.

The case report describes the first treatment of a person suffering from severe COVID-19 with APN01 in named patient use. The data published show the expected observations of an adaptive immune response, a rapid loss of virus load and reduction in inflammatory mediators, and the development of high titers of neutralizing antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 leading to a significant clinical improvement of the patient treated.

'Blocks and protects'

Josef Penninger, co-inventor of APN01, founder of APEIRON and co-author of the publication, said: “Providing first data on the effect of blocking the viral spike glycoprotein in patients with COVID-19 is of paramount importance. The data confirm the mode of action of APN01 specifically targeting the SARS-CoV-2 virus.

“Our findings from the first SARS epidemic and recent research have identified ACE2 as the entry door for both corona viruses, SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2, to infect human cells. The new data further support the ability of APN01 to locking the door for the virus. Importantly, in contrast to basically all other drug candidates, APN01 has a dual action – it blocks the virus and can protect the lung, blood vessels or the heart from injury via its enzyme function. The compassionate use findings provide essential data that this important enzyme function of APN01 is preserved in treated COVID-19 patients.”

Hopes for accelerated approval

Peter Llewellyn-Davies, chief executive of APEIRON, said: “We are delighted our drug candidate APN01 may have helped this patient to overcome the life-threatening disease and are confident to confirm these positive results in our ongoing and progressing pivotal clinical Phase II trial. The further scientific validation by this renowned journal encourages us in our efforts to providing an efficacious therapy against COVID-19 for the benefit of patients and society.”

It is possible that, if the current Phase II study is positive, accelerated market approval could be granted.

The company-sponsored Phase II study is ongoing in Austria, Germany, Denmark, UK, and Russia and is expected to be expanded to the USA. The double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled study aims to treat 200 patients with severe COVID-19 disease.

https://www.imba.oeaw.ac.at/research-highlights/case-study-confirms-effect-of-ace2-drug-candidate-against-covid-19/

Interesting, most of the focus has been on a vaccine so far rather than a highly effective treatment. A vaccine will still probably be needed to end the pandemic, but a drug like this would also go a long way in helping. If it continues to be successful in trials, do you know when it might get approval?

A vaccine might still be needed, but considering that only 30-50% of Americans or Austrians want to get a vaccine themselves, a drug like this is the option of choice for those people ...

[Tender Branson]

We are now averaging ca. 700 new cases per day.

Ca. 3x the rate of Germany per capita.

But the number of active cases seems to have peaked around 8.300 for now, as the number of recoveries has been slightly outpacing new cases for almost a week.

[CumbrianLefty]

The treatment of students in the UK - starting in Scotland but now moving south of the border too - is shaping up to be a genuine scandal.

[Omega21]

The treatment of students in the UK - starting in Scotland but now moving south of the border too - is shaping up to be a genuine scandal.

I'm not really in the loop, what do you mean?

I know things have been getting uglier there as well, but not much else.

[Silent Hunter]

People are going to university, Covid-19 cases are turning in halls and thousands are forced to self-isolate with little planning on how they are going to get food etc.

[CumbrianLefty]

Striking too that polls only show lukewarm support for this, compared to the strong backing still given to most anti-virus measures. Not hard to see at least a degree of backtracking on the way.

[Silent Hunter]

It seems that the majority of cases in the UK are among younger people now. Many of whom are not inclined to listen to 50-something adults at the best of times.

[𝕭𝖆𝖕𝖙𝖎𝖘𝖙𝖆 𝕸𝖎𝖓𝖔𝖑𝖆]

New cases per day in Italy have been creeping up pretty slowly. I guess "flatten the curve" is real (fingers crossed).

In other news, PLEASE someone make PSOL come back here and rename the thread, we have just surpassed 1,000,000 deaths and the number of cases is above 33,000,000.

[CumbrianLefty]

Now talk of at least large parts of England going into a second full lockdown.

Oh joy.

[President Johnson]

Seems like around 2,000 new infections per day is the new normal in Germany. However, Merkel warned that it could be ten times as high in a month or two if people neglect mask wearing and social distancing.

Federal and state governments today agreed to limit private gatherings and celebrations to 50 people after such repeatedly turned out to be superspreading events. The city of Hamm as an example saw a drastic increase in cases last month as a result of a single wedding with over 200 people and at least one attendee was infected. This event might have legal consequences after all.

Furthermore, there's now going to be a penalty of 50€ for restaurant visitors who provide false personal data. Apparently, as many as half of contact data is incorrect with folks deliberately giving false names, making contact tracking to stop infection chains next to impossible. However, I'm not sure how they want to find people providing false names unless restaurant employees check passports or driver licenses.

[palandio]

[...]
Furthermore, there's now going to be a penalty of 50€ for restaurant visitors who provide false personal data. Apparently, as many as half of contact data is incorrect with folks deliberately giving false names, making contact tracking to stop infection chains next to impossible. However, I'm not sure how they want to find people providing false names unless restaurant employees check passports or driver licenses.

Many would probably have provided names like Darth Vader or Angela Merkel anyways, but the fact that the police in Bavaria and some other Länder very soon began to use the data for investigations even in minor cases completely unrelated to the health emergency certainly didn't increase confidence in the appropriate use of the data.

[Silent Hunter]

We've got a QR code reader incorporated into our app that allows for an anonymous check-in. Does your app?

[Tender Branson]

A 31-year old man has died in the City of Salzburg.

It's the 41st death in the state and must be one of the youngest in all of Austria.

I'm only aware of 2 other deaths under the age of 60 since the start of this.

https://www.salzburg.gv.at/themen/gesundheit/corona-virus

[Zinneke]

A 31-year old man has died in the City of Salzburg.

It's the 41st death in the state and must be one of the youngest in all of Austria.

I'm only aware of 2 other deaths under the age of 60 since the start of this.

https://www.salzburg.gv.at/themen/gesundheit/corona-virus

Out of how many cases?

[Tender Branson]

A 31-year old man has died in the City of Salzburg.

It's the 41st death in the state and must be one of the youngest in all of Austria.

I'm only aware of 2 other deaths under the age of 60 since the start of this.

https://www.salzburg.gv.at/themen/gesundheit/corona-virus

Out of how many cases?

There were 799 Covid deaths in Austria until today, so there were 3 deaths below age 60.

[Tender Branson]

All of Austria’s government has switched to home office in the afternoon, after 1 key aide of Chancellor Kurz has tested positive.

The aide was also present during the Cabinet council meeting last Wednesday.

All government members and workers at the Chancellery have been tested today and await results at home.

https://kurier.at/politik/inland/kurz-und-sein-kabinett-geht-ins-homeoffice/401054662

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-austria/austrias-kurz-cancels-meetings-as-colleague-tests-positive-for-covid-19-idUSKBN26Q21P

[President Johnson]

Germany has now reached 300,000 infections in total. About 27,000 are currently infected, while over 263,000 have recovered. 9,534 deaths so far.

[𝕭𝖆𝖕𝖙𝖎𝖘𝖙𝖆 𝕸𝖎𝖓𝖔𝖑𝖆]

Italy has now broken hard 2,000 new cases per day. We have barely surpassed 36,000 total deaths. It's pretty sad. Well ok it's nowhere near as sad as March was actually.
I pray the curve does not explode again like it has done for example in France and Spain.

[Tender Branson]

All of Austria’s government has switched to home office in the afternoon, after 1 key aide of Chancellor Kurz has tested positive.

The aide was also present during the Cabinet council meeting last Wednesday.

All government members and workers at the Chancellery have been tested today and await results at home.

https://kurier.at/politik/inland/kurz-und-sein-kabinett-geht-ins-homeoffice/401054662

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-austria/austrias-kurz-cancels-meetings-as-colleague-tests-positive-for-covid-19-idUSKBN26Q21P

All government members have been tested negative in the 1st round of tests.

[CumbrianLefty]

More fun and games in the UK yesterday as it emerged the huge numbers of "lost" tests was due to not just some bright spark entering them on Excel, but not even being aware of the basics of doing so.

(channelling Father Ted taking to Dougal - "that's a ROW, and this is a COLUMN")

[Cassius]

More fun and games in the UK yesterday as it emerged the huge numbers of "lost" tests was due to not just some bright spark entering them on Excel, but not even being aware of the basics of doing so.

(channelling Father Ted taking to Dougal - "that's a ROW, and this is a COLUMN")

Recruiting only the brightest and best to the Civil Service Summer Diversity Internship Programme I see.

[CumbrianLefty]

Nice joke, but I think it wasn't the civil service actually responsible for this?

(rather, one of the government's favourite "outsourcing" pals)

[Silent Hunter]

Nope, looks like it was PHE.

[Cassius]

I mean in reality I’d never blame an intern for this sort of thing, because that’s what you expect them to do and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that.

[President Johnson]

Some good news on the search for a vaccine: The European Medicines Agency has given green light for the final approval process of a vaccine candidate developed by the German company Biontech in cooperation with Pfizer. Their vaccine candidate "BNT162b2" has successfully gone through all three phases of study.

https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2020/10/06/2104060/0/en/BioNTech-and-Pfizer-Initiate-Rolling-Submission-to-European-Medicines-Agency-for-SARS-CoV-2-Vaccine-Candidate-BNT162b2.html