Tag: Covid

Florida Surgeon General Joe Ladapo investigated for allegedly falsifying Covid report

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Ladapo’s report was used as evidence in vaccine guidance he released in October that came under heavy criticism from the medical community, which said the surgeon general’s stance that the vaccine posed a health risk in healthy young men was flawed and went against Covid-vaccine recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and the American Academy of Pediatrics. The guidance even prompted Twitter to temporarily block a social media post from the surgeon general promoting the analysis, though the company later restored it.
The inspector general’s office opened the investigation in November after it received the complaint and later closed it an undisclosed date after the complainant didn’t respond to follow-up questions regarding the accusations, according to state documents that include a copy of the original complaint.
Nothing is known about the complainant, and anyone can submit a grievance with the Department of Health’s inspector general. But the individual appeared to have detailed knowledge of state health agencies, according to the documents the Florida Department of Health provided to POLITICO.
Ladapo on Wednesday called the accusations against him untrue and said the report in question was completed by a team of staffers at the Florida Department of Health.
“It’s factually false,” Ladapo said in an interview with POLITICO. “I trust the team — they used our Florida data, they performed the analysis, and we’re an accredited public health organization.”
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis hand-picked Ladapo, a Harvard-educated medical doctor, to be his top health official in 2021. Ladapo has long questioned the safety of Covid-19 vaccines and at one point joined a petition to urge the FDA against quickly authorizing the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. Ladapo found a national audience early in the pandemic by writing opinion pieces in The Wall Street Journal and USA Today that criticized community lockdowns and the use of facemasks.
The November complaint against Ladapo asked the inspector general to speak with employees at the state Department of Health Communicable Disease Division, who helped write earlier drafts of the report that was eventually released. Emails were kept to a minimum, the complainant wrote, and notes were hand-delivered.
“You may not find these documents by email, as they get transmitted by hand,” the complainant stated, according to state documents. “But they have been seen by several individuals.

“Lots of people know about this,” the individual stated.
Ladapo, however, stood by his Covid guidance and defended his stance on vaccines.
“Between my scientific experience, and training and the fact that I am only comfortable saying the truth and speaking the truth, I felt completely fine with that announcement,” Ladapo said. “That’s what the data show.”
Ladapo said experts who have rejected his ideas are unwilling to face what he called honesty in modern medical care.
“It really strains credulity to try and write this off as being anything but related to the safety of these mRNA Covid vaccines,” Ladapo said. “I think people should know that it’s OK to believe what their eyes are showing them.”
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#Florida #Surgeon #General #Joe #Ladapo #investigated #allegedly #falsifying #Covid #report
( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

February 23, 2023
Gurugram: Woman locks self, son for 3 years in house to escape Covid, rescued

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Gurugram: A 33-year-old woman, who had locked herself and her minor son for three years in their rented house in Chakkarpur area here to avoid COVID-19, was brought out of confinement on Tuesday by a team of officials, police said.
A team of police, health department officials and members of the child welfare department broke open the main door of the house and rescued Munmun Majhi and her 10-year-old son, they said.
The mother-son duo was rushed to the civil hospital here.
“The woman has some psychological issues. Both of them are referred to PGI, Rohtak where they are admitted to psychiatric ward for treatment,” said Dr Virender Yadav, Civil Surgeon, Gurugram.
The matter came to light on February 17 when Munmun’s husband Sujan Majhi, who is an engineer with a private company, approached assistant sub-inspector Praveen Kumar deployed at Chakkarpur police post.
During the three years of confinement with her son, the woman did not allow even her husband into the house after he stepped out to go to office when restrictions eased after the first lockdown in 2020, police said.
Sujan spent the first few days with friends and relatives and after failing to persuade his wife, he started to stay in another rented accommodation in the same locality.
Sujan said that video calls were the only way to stay in touch with his wife and son. He would pay the monthly rent of the house, clear the electricity bills, deposit his son’s school fees, buy groceries and vegetables and even leave the bags of ration outside the main door.

“Initially, I didn’t believe Sujan’s claims, but when he made me talk to his wife and son over a video call, I intervened in the matter. The house where the woman was living had accumulated so much filth and garbage that if a few more days had passed, anything untoward could have happened,” ASI Kumar told PTI.
The woman’s son had not even seen the sun in the last three years, Kumar said, adding that she did not even use cooking gas and storage water during these three years in fear of Covid.
Sujan was overwhelmed to have his wife and son after three years, and thanked the police.
“Now they are being treated and I hope my life will be back on track soon,” he said. PTI CORR
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#Gurugram #Woman #locks #son #years #house #escape #Covid #rescued
( With inputs from www.siasat.com )

February 22, 2023
Deaths in US prisons up by 50% during 1st Covid year: Report

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Washington: US state and federal prisons saw deaths surging nearly 50 per cent during the first year of the Covid-19 pandemic, and in six states they had more than doubled, a media report revealed.
The New York Times report on Sunday was the first comprehensive data on prison fatalities in the era of the pandemic.
“The tremendous jump in deaths in 2020 was more than twice the increase in the US overall, and even exceeded estimates of the percentage increase at nursing homes, among the hardest-hit sectors nationwide,” Xinhua news agency reported citing the newspaper as saying.
While there was ample evidence that prisons were Covid hot spots, the data underscored how quickly the virus rampaged through crowded facilities, and how an aging inmate population, a correctional staffing shortage and ill-equipped medical personnel combined to make prisoners especially vulnerable during the worst public health crisis in a century, according to the report.
Covid infections drove the death tolls, but inmates also succumbed to other illnesses, suicide and violence, according to the data, which was collected by law school researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles.
Altogether, at least 6,182 people died in American prisons in 2020, compared with 4,240 the previous year, even as the country’s prison population declined to about 1.3 million from more than 1.4 million, the report said.
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#Deaths #prisons #1st #Covid #year #Report

( With inputs from www.siasat.com )

February 20, 2023
Organ damage persists in almost 60 pc of long Covid patients a year after initial diagnosis: Study

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London: Scientists have found that organ damage persisted in 59 per cent of long Covid patients a year after initial symptoms, even in those not severely affected when first diagnosed with the virus, according to a new study.
The study also found that 29 per cent of patients with long COVID had multi-organ impairment, with persistent symptoms and reduced function at six and twelve months, it said.
The comprehensive study of organ impairment in long COVID patients over 12 months focused on patients reporting extreme breathlessness, cognitive dysfunction and poor health-related quality of life, it said.
According to the study, of the 536 patients who were studied, 13 per cent were hospitalised when first diagnosed with COVID-19, with 32 per cent of people taking part in the study being healthcare workers.
The study found that of the 536 patients, 331, or 62 per cent, were identified with organ impairment six months after their initial diagnosis. It is published in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine.
These patients were followed up six months later with a 40-minute multi-organ MRI scan (Perspectum’s CoverScan), analysed in Oxford, the study said.
“Symptoms were common at six and twelve months and associated with female gender, younger age and single organ impairment,” said Amitava Banerjee, Professor of Clinical Data Science at the UCL Institute of Health Informatics, UK.
The study reported a reduction in symptoms between six and 12 months, it said.

Extreme breathlessness came down from being reported in 38 per cent of the patients to 30 per cent of patients, the study said, while cognitive dysfunction came down from 48 per cent to 38 per cent.
Poor health-related quality of life came down from 57 per cent to 45 per cent of patients, the study said.
“Several studies confirm persistence of symptoms in individuals with long COVID up to one year.
“We now add that three in five people with long COVID have impairment in at least one organ, and one in four have impairment in two or more organs, in some cases without symptoms,” said Banerjee.
“Impact on quality of life and time off work, particularly in healthcare workers, is a major concern for individuals, health systems and economies.
“Many healthcare workers in our study had no prior illness, but of 172 such participants, 19 were still symptomatic at follow-up and off work at a median of 180 days,” said Banerjee.
The underlying mechanisms of long COVID remain elusive, said the researchers, who did not find evidence by symptoms, blood investigations or MRI to clearly define long COVID subtypes, the study said.
They said that future research must consider associations between symptoms, multi-organ impairment and function in larger cohorts.
“Organ impairment in long COVID has implications for symptoms, quality of life and longer-term health, signalling the need for prevention and integrated care for long COVID patients,” said Banerjee.
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#Organ #damage #persists #long #Covid #patients #year #initial #diagnosis #Study
( With inputs from www.siasat.com )

February 16, 2023
China’s provinces spent almost £43bn on Covid measures in 2022

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Chinese provinces spent more than £42.8bn on tackling Covid-19 in 2022, according to data released by local governments, with the figure expected to rise as the huge cost of the pandemic hits the world’s second-largest economy.
Although national statistics are not yet available, at least 20 of China’s 31 provinces have published figures on how much money they spent on measures to control the pandemic.
China abandoned its zero-Covid policy in December. It is now trying to revive the sagging economy, which grew by just 3% in 2022, down from 8.4% in 2021, according to official statistics.
Different provinces measure their Covid-19 expenditures in different ways. Some include spending at all levels of government, while others only include provincial-level spending.
But according to the published data, the southern province of Guangdong, which is home to 127 million people and is China’s largest provincial economy, was the biggest spender. In 2022 it spent 71.1bn yuan (£8.6bn) on measures such as vaccination, testing and emergency benefits for people affected by the pandemic – an increase of more than 50% on the previous year. That spending equated to about 0.6% of the province’s gross domestic product in 2022. Before the pandemic, China spent about 5% of its GDP a year on healthcare.
Beijing spent 26.4bn yuan, mainly on epidemic control and prevention, the equivalent of about 111% of the city’s healthcare budget for last year. Shanghai, the country’s financial hub, spent 16.8bn yuan on similar Covid-prevention measures, including the construction of temporary hospitals. The two months of total lockdown in Shanghai hit the city’s economy, which contracted by 0.2% in 2022.
Since abandoning zero-Covid, China’s government has introduced various measures to try and stimulate economic growth. On 8 January, it reopened its borders for international travel, abandoning quarantine requirements for inbound travellers. The government has also announced measures to make it easier for property companies to raise financing after investment in 2022 fell by 10%, the first decline since records began. The real estate industry accounted for nearly one-quarter of China’s GDP in 2021, but a crackdown on the sector last year hit the economy.
Public spending can now be redirected towards measures designed to boost the economy. Local governments have embarked on a hiring spree of civil servants, with a plan to increase recruitment by 16%. Economists at the US investment bank Goldman Sachs forecast China’s growth in 2023 will reach 6.5%, boosting global demand by 1%.

But for ordinary Chinese, the cost of Covid-19 remains high. In December, China’s National Health Commission stopped publishing data on daily cases, amid concerns about a huge rise in infections after the end of the zero-Covid policy. China has officially recorded around 80,000 Covid-19 deaths since December, which would be a far lower death rate than Hong Kong experienced in the first two months of its Omicron wave. Still, other indicators suggest that illnesses and deaths are much higher: hospitals and mortuaries are overcrowded, and doctors in many places have run short of Covid-19 medicines.
Additional research by Xiaoqian Zhu
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#Chinas #provinces #spent #43bn #Covid #measures
( With inputs from : www.theguardian.com )

February 15, 2023
Indian-origin businessman jailed for COVID loan abuse in UK

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London: An Indian-origin businessman in south east England has been sentenced to 12 months’ imprisonment after admitting abuse of an interest-free loan offered by the UK government to businesses to cope with the Covid-19 lockdown.
Kulwinder Singh Sidhu, 58, from Stanwell in Surrey, pleaded guilty to offences under the UK Companies Act and the Fraud Act for having abused the Bounce Back Loan financial support scheme in 2020.
He was director of Wavylane Ltd, a haulage company based in Stanwell trading since 2010, and was found to have dissolved it soon after receiving a 50,000-pound taxpayer-funded loan and transferring the funds to a personal account.
“Our action has ensured repayment of the loan money and taxpayers have not been left out of pocket,” said Julie Barnes, Chief Investigator at the UK’s Insolvency Service.
“Any other company directors who might be tempted into dissolving their business to try to keep public money they are not entitled to, should be aware they are risking a lengthy prison term,” she said.
Under the UK government’s Bounce Back Loan scheme, genuine businesses impacted by the pandemic could take out interest-free taxpayer-backed loans of up to a maximum of 50,000 pounds.
Sidhu applied on behalf of his business on June 9, 2020, and it was paid into his company bank account.
On 26 June 2020, Sidhu filed paperwork with the UK’s Companies House to have the business dissolved.

The striking-off application to dissolve the company was explicit that interested parties and creditors, such as a bank with an outstanding loan, must be notified within seven days of making an application to dissolve a company.
The form also highlighted that failure to notify interested parties is a criminal offence, however, the Insolvency Service found Sidhu did not follow these rules.
The company was ultimately dissolved in October 2020 and went on to be identified as likely Bounce Back Loan fraud by the Insolvency Service and cross-government counter-fraud systems.
Their investigation found that Sidhu had “fraudulently” overstated the company turnover in the Bounce Back Loan application, and within two days of receiving the money he had transferred it to his personal account before dispersing the funds to his son and another company.
Sidhu went on to plead guilty at Guildford Crown Court in December last year and was sentenced this week at the same court, which also imposed a confiscation order for 50,000 pounds which has been paid in full.
In addition to the custodial sentence, Sidhu is disqualified as a company director for six years.
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#Indianorigin #businessman #jailed #COVID #loan #abuse
( With inputs from www.siasat.com )

February 15, 2023
Centre relaxes Covid travel norms for passengers from China, other countries

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New Delhi: Amid declining Covid cases in the country, the Center on Thursday relaxed the travel norms for passengers from China and other six countries. However, the random testing of 2 per cent travelers coming to India will continue.
Updating the ‘Guidelines for International Arrivals’, the Health Ministry has dropped the existing requirements of pre-departure Covid-19 testing and uploading of Self-Health Declaration for international travellers coming from/via China, Singapore, Hong Kong, South Korea, Thailand, and Japan.
In a letter to the Civil Aviation Ministry, the Health Ministry has said: “As has been witnessed in the last 4 weeks, these countries are witnessing a sustained and significant decline in trajectory of Covid-19 cases. Further, as per World Health Organisation’s latest situational update on Covid-19, a decline of 89 per cent in the number of newly confirmed cases in the past 28 days has been noted globally as compared to 28 days prior to that.”
“Meanwhile, India has continued to witness a declining trajectory, with less than 100 new cases/day are being reported. In view of the above, this Ministry is updating its ‘Guidelines for International Arrivals’, and dropping the existing requirements of pre-departure Covid-19 testing and uploading of Self-Health Declaration on Ministry of Civil Aviation’s ‘Air Suvidha’ portal applicable for international travellers coming from/via China, Singapore, Hong Kong, Republic of Korea, Thailand and Japan,” it said in the letter.
Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan has said in the letter, “In order to monitor infections due to mutated variants of SARS-CoV-2 among international travellers to India, the present exercise of random testing of 2 per cent travellers to India (irrespective of country of origin) upon arrival India shall continue.”
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#Centre #relaxes #Covid #travel #norms #passengers #China #countries
( With inputs from www.siasat.com )

February 9, 2023
Estimate of misspent Covid unemployment payments leaps to $191B

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But federal officials acknowledge that they cannot precisely identify how much federal aid was wrongfully sent out.
Background: UI benefits are just one of a handful of large government programs that were created or expanded during the pandemic to help individuals and businesses harmed by the disruptions it caused to the economy.
At the time, policymakers made the choice to prioritize getting money out quickly, sometimes at the expense of safeguards to prevent fraudsters from exploiting the system, and the government has subsequently stepped up efforts to recover misspent funds or prosecute bad actors.
Wednesday’s hearing comes a week after one held by the House Oversight Committee with an overlapping witness list. During that earlier hearing government officials warned that these types of assistance programs continue to have significant gaps that leave them susceptible to theft and wrongful spending.
The unemployment system is particularly vulnerable because it is administered jointly by individual states and the federal government, resulting in a patchwork of rules and — in many states — outmoded technology that got overwhelmed during the heights of the pandemic.
What’s next: President Joe Biden called for additional action as part of his State of the Union address Tuesday, including extending the amount of time prosecutors have to bring charges.
“Let’s triple our anti-fraud strike forces going after these criminals, double the statute of limitations on these crimes and crack down on identity fraud by criminal syndicates stealing billions of dollars from the American people,” Biden said.
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#Estimate #misspent #Covid #unemployment #payments #leaps #191B
( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

February 8, 2023
Study: No new COVID variants from China since zero-COVID policy lifted

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Fears that China’s lifting of its zero-COVID policy could result in fresh coronavirus variants seem to have not (yet) materialized.
A study published in The Lancet on Wednesday found there had been no new COVID-19 variants in the country since it lifted its draconian policy last year, a move which triggered a surge in cases and deaths.
The analysis by researchers in China of more than 400 new cases in Beijing between November 14 and December 20 shows that more than 90 percent were of the Omicron subvariants BA.5.2 and BF.7.
These variants are similar to the ones circulating in the EU/EEA during the fall of 2022, before the surge in cases in China, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) said, and there is no evidence they pose a greater risk compared with those circulating in the EU/EEA now.
China has been criticized for its lack of transparency throughout the pandemic, including during this most recent wave of infections.
But the EU’s disease agency, the ECDC, confirmed that its own analysis — which included sequencing cases detected through airport arrivals in several European countries and wastewater analysis of airplanes arriving in Europe from China — found that BA.5.2 and BF.7 were dominant, although they cautioned that this wastewater data is “quite limited and are still being verified.”
While the authors of the Lancet study conducted their analysis in Beijing, they write that the results “could be considered a snapshot of China.”
But others caution against such a leap.

“The SARS-CoV-2 molecular epidemiological profile in one region of a vast and densely populated country cannot be extrapolated to the entire country,” write Wolfgang Preiser and Tongai Maponga of Stellenbosch University in South Africa in a linked comment in The Lancet. The two were not involved in the study.
“In other regions of China, other evolutionary dynamics might unfold, possibly including animal species that could become infected by human beings and spill back a further evolved virus,” they write.
The prevalence of each of the two variants — BF.7 and BA.5.2 — varies from province to province, World Health Organization spokesperson Christian Lindmeier told POLITICO, referring to data from the China CDC.
Travel restrictions
China’s lifting of its zero-COVID policies at the end of last year led to EU countries recommending a raft of travel measures for visitors from China.
At its last meeting on Friday, the EU’s de facto emergency crisis forum, the IPCR, decided to maintain these measures for now. The issue will be reevaluated at the next IPCR meeting scheduled for February 16.
Europe’s airport lobby, ACI Europe, says it would like passenger testing to be dropped.
“We support getting away from testing passengers as a way to track COVID-19, especially in the context of the comprehensive assessment issued by the ECDC on the lack of expected impact of COVID-19 surge in China on the epidemiological situation in the EU/EEA. Airports and airlines call for any travel recommendations to be scientifically driven and risk-based, which is regrettably not the case now,”Agata Łyżnik, communications manager at ACI Europe, the European airports’ lobby, told POLITICO.
With additional reporting from Mari Eccles.

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#Study #COVID #variants #China #zeroCOVID #policy #lifted
( With inputs from : www.politico.eu )

February 8, 2023
Centre ‘forcefully stopped Pfizer’s COVID vaccine: KCR hits out at Modi-govt

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Nanded: Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao has alleged that the Central government did everything possible to “forcefully” prevent import of COVID-19 vaccines from Pfizer, especially when people were ready to get the best vaccine.
Rao claimed that he and several other Chief Ministers had lobbied for Pfizer in India, but the PM Modi Government stalled the entry of the US pharmaceutical giant into India.
The Chief Minister’s remark at his recent rally in Maharashtra’s Nanded came days after Union Minister of State for Electronics and Technology Rajeev Chandrasekhar claimed that Pfizer had “tried to bully the Indian government into accepting an indemnity clause for supplying its mRNA COVID vaccine”.
MoS Chandrasekhar, shared a tweet of Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla during the World Economic Forum in Davos in which the pharma company official stated that senior leaders in the Opposition had put pressure on the Centre to procure foreign-made vaccines during the pandemic rather than choosing Made in India vaccines.
Addressing a press conference in Maharashtra’s Nanded on Sunday, KCR said that “Make in India” has become a “Joke in India.”
“Today many multinational companies are leaving China, but why are we not able to attract them? Why are those companies not turning towards us? If Make in India would have been right, ease of doing would have been right, if they were feasible, then why were not allowed to come to India?
“There is a company namely Pfizer, which manufactures vaccines, it was stopped from entering India during COVID-19. No matter how hard the company tried but they (the Centre) did not allow them to come here. What was the reason?” questioned the Telangana chief minister.
“While the public wanted to get the best vaccine, people also wanted to buy it, yet the company was stopped forcefully. We also tried, many Chief Ministers also had talks with PMO and Niti Aayog but they (Govt) did not allow them (Pfizer) to come,” KCR said.

KCR claimed that several multinational companies which were leaving China, like Pfizer, were being prevented from entering India and the Central government was promoting slogans of ‘Make in India’ to encourage crony capitalism and mislead people.
“Where is the environment in India? Do we have an environment of Make in India like the slogans they are giving? Do we have ease of doing business? Are we provided with the facilities? If there is, then why are we are not able to get international companies?” he asked.
Taking a dig at the Centre, KCR further alleged, “They will work for those who are their friends. Will inflate their stock market, why will they let others to come?”
But the Central government had said that they will not buy the COVID-19 vaccine from Pfizer and Moderna because indigenous vaccines will be more affordable and easier to store.
India was in discussions with US companies Pfizer and Moderna in 2021 for the supply of these international vaccines but their terms and conditions were not accepted ultimately by India. The Centre declined to meet the requests by the US pharma firms for legal protection over any side effects from the use of their vaccines, which are widely used in the United States and Europe.
However, India successfully vaccinated its citizens, with “Made in India” vaccines under its nationwide vaccination drive, under which over 220.16 crore doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been administered in the two years since its launch.
Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya recently tweeted that India’s feat was the “world’s largest and most successful vaccination drive.” He saluted the efforts of doctors and other healthcare workers on the front line who made this achievement possible.
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#Centre #forcefully #stopped #Pfizers #COVID #vaccine #KCR #hits #Modigovt
( With inputs from www.siasat.com )

February 8, 2023