Month: April 2021

About one in 10 Americans haven't gotten their second scheduled dose of COVID-19 vaccine, and while that worries epidemiologists, the follow-through is far better than other adult two-dose vaccines. According to recent data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about 92% of people who got the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna COVID-19 vaccine made it back for their second shot. Experts noted such completion numbers for the two-dose regime of the most widely-used vaccines against the coronavirus are a cause for celebration.  "With the biggest mass vaccination program in history, 92% of people coming back for their second shot is a huge victory," said Dr. Monica Gandhi, an infectious disease specialist at the University of California, San Francisco. The second shot matters because i...

Pfizer, which along with Moderna developed successful mRNA vaccines against COVID-19 late last year, announced on Tuesday that it could have ready by the end of the year an experimental oral drug which would treat COVID-19 as soon as patients display symptoms. The announcement was made by CEO Albert Bourla on the CNBC program "Squawk Box," who said that for the drug to be released to the public it will first need to perform well at clinical trials and receive approval by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). "This is an inhibitor of the protease enzyme in the SARS-CoV-2 which is promising in pre-clinical studies to block the ability of the virus to replicate," Dr. Monica Gandhi, infectious disease doctor and professor of medicine at the University of California — San Francisco, told Sal...

SAN FRANCISCO – Hearing of excess vaccine and unfilled appointments frustrates Dr. Aaron Roland, a family physician who has been lobbying for doses to inoculate his patients, many of whom are low-income, immigrants or elderly. The San Francisco Bay Area doctor has more than 200 patients who have inquired when he will offer inoculations against the coronavirus. One patient, who is 67, said he walked into a Safeway supermarket because signs said doses were available. "But they said, ‘Oh no, they’re not really available. You just have to go online, just sign up online.’ It’s not something he does very easily," said Dr. Roland, whose practice is in Burlingame, south of San Francisco. California, swimming in vaccine, is in far better shape than just weeks ago when scoring an appointment wa...

Last Updated Apr 28, 2021 7:03 PM EDT Philadelphia is experiencing a surplus scare. With thousands of coronavirus vaccine doses expiring on Thursday, the city is scrambling to ship them to other distribution sites so it won't be forced to discard them.  "The city has a lot of vaccines in cold storage that do have to get used in a very short timeline," said Charlie Elison, a FEMA spokesperson.  Philadelphia officials are hoping to vaccinate more people by keeping sites open later to attract walk-ups for those who don't have an appointment.  Meanwhile, more shots are sitting unused across the country.   For the first time since March 22, the U.S. is averaging less than 2.5 million vaccinations a day. Vaccinations are down nearly 25% aft...

There is no evidence linking the deaths of two Australians to coronavirus vaccine doses they received, the chief of the country's medicines regulator said on Thursday. The deaths in the most populous state of New South Wales (NSW) came just days after the men got the shots, media said. One was a 71-year-old with several underlying conditions, who took the AstraZeneca (AZN.L) vaccine, Seven News said. The other, aged 55, died within eight days of his shot, a newspaper in the northwestern town of Tamworth said, citing his family. However, evidence suggested no link to a COVID-19 inoculation, said John Skerritt, the head of the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA). "The current evidence does not suggest a likely association," Skerritt told reporters in Canberra, the capital. "We do have to...