Archives of “COVID-19” category

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Analyst who questioned AstraZeneca vaccine lays out his case

  
Analysis, COVID-19

SVB Leerink’s Geoffrey Porges speaks on Bloomberg TV

SVB Leerink's Geoffrey Porges speaks on Bloomberg TV
Porges was in the news today because he questioned AstraZeneca’s vaccine news today, saying that the company embellished the data and that it will never be approved in the US.
“It wasn’t particularly clear what the efficacy was… then they changed the dose, partway through because of a manufacturing problem and serendipitously that created a much better outcome in a small sample.”
He said you can’t draw too many conclusions from 2700 test patients, it’s a small sample.
He highlighted how the spike protein via a primate vector and that could be
“I’m going to be signing up for the 90%, not the one that’s 70%, maybe 60%, maybe 90%,” he said.
Executives said they will publish the full data set later in the week.
Porges said he wants to see the full safety database, data on showing whether there are adverse events and whether it helps prevent severe cases.
His report hurt the shares of AstraZeneca earlier today and still remain about 2% lower.

US coronavirus – LA County has banned all in-person dining at restaurants

  
Analysis, COVID-19

Restrictions in the US continue to ramp up.

This the latest from California, to take effect from Wednesday this week. In response to the continued acceleration in new COVID-19 cases.
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The US is seeing a surge of travel ahead of Thanksgiving as families and friends get together. The UK will be relaxing restrictions over Christmas for a similar sort of celebration. It is terribly difficult trying to get a balance between restricting the spread of the virus and restricting people’s movement.

US hits a record daily high for COVID-19 cases: 185,000 new infections Thursday

  
Analysis, COVID-19

Reuters tallying up Thursday’s results, the highest single-day increase since the pandemic started.

Hospitals are already under severe strain, some at capacity. healthcare workers are overwhelmed. Adding in 185k new cases a day only stuffs the pipeline of admissions (and deaths) further and further. Its going to be a cold and bitter winter coming up in the US.

Reuters tallying up Thursday's results, the highest single-day increase since the pandemic started.

UK and Italy virus case count numbers rise

  
Analysis, COVID-19

Numbers tick higher today but plateau continues

The latest UK and Italian virus numbers are higher than yesterday but the overall trend remains towards a plateau.
Italian reports 36,176 new cases and 653 deaths. On Nov 13, Italy reported a record 40,902 cases and they’ve been around 35K throughout this month. There are early signs of turn lower but this is the part of the week where we usually see an uptick.
In the UK, cases rose 22,915 compared to 19,905 yesterday. There were 501 deaths with 529 yesterday. It’s a similar story in the UK. Despite the uptick, there are clear signs of a plateau. Hopefully we will be seeing signs of turn lower very soon because we’re now weeks into the new set of restrictions.
Numbers tick higher today but plateau continues

Another round of vaccine optimism rinse and repeat

  
Analysis, COVID-19

But to a lesser degree and perhaps shorter lasting timeframe

Pfizer passed the final hurdle of meeting the safety requirements to apply for emergency-use approval, but the announcement also came with a bit of an attempt to try and one up Moderna as they claim that their vaccine is 95% effective upon final analysis.
Dow
Either way, the market is responding in the only way it knows how to. Dow futures pulled a little higher and equities in general are more buoyant after the news.
However, the gains are more modest and to a lesser degree than the Pfizer announcement last week and the Moderna announcement from Monday.
Treasury yields pared its earlier decline to move up to 0.87% but is now keeping little changed around 0.86% as we start to get towards North American trading.
In the currencies space though, there has been little to no impact as major currencies are largely still sticking with the theme from earlier i.e. slight dollar weakness but not pushing the agenda beyond key technical levels across the board.
It looks like the market appetite for any further vaccine optimism is starting to wear thin, and that’s not a good sign if the negative virus developments continue to keep up over the next few days/weeks as the push and pull continues in trading currently.

China’s Sinovac coronavirus vaccine candidate – trials show it appears to be safe

  
Analysis, COVID-19

COVID-19 China vaccine candidate update via Reuters:

 

 

  •  Sinovac’s covid-19 vaccine appeared to be safe and well-tolerated at all tested doses – phase i/ii trial results
  • findings from phase iii will be crucial to determine Coronavac’s immune response – study
  • Sinovac’s vaccine Coronavac suitable for emergency use during the pandemic, researchers say
  • antibody levels induced by the coronavac vaccine were lower than those seen in people who had recovered from covid-19 – study

 

more to come

McConnell: Senate still wants to pass more covid aid

  
Analysis, COVID-19

Comment from the Senate majority leader

  • Hopes Congress can reach top line bipartisan agreement on government funding measure by year-end
  • Next few days will show whether Congress can agree on a bipartisan funding package
Politico’s Jake Sherman earlier reported:
There are no conversations right now about another round of Covid relief. None. The White House is silent. The Hill is quiet. That means no new programs, no new money for Americans before the holiday season.
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