Deadly pandemics usually feature denial from leaders, often prioritizing money, historians say
The COVID-19 "plague," as President Trump likes to call it, is caused by a new coronavirus. But viral pandemics and deadly plagues aren't new. And neither is initially pretending the disease won't affect your region, or prematurely declaring victory.

"A century ago, the Spanish flu epidemic's second wave was far deadlier than its first, in part because authorities allowed mass gatherings from Philadelphia to San Francisco," The Associated Press reports in an article about the "growing dread" health experts feel about "an all-but-certain second wave of deaths and infections that could force governments to clamp back down." In the U.S., the first wave hasn't yet crested.

"Almost every epidemic you can think of, the first reaction of any government is to say, 'No, no, it's not here. We haven't got it,'" British historian and pandemic researcher Richard Evans tells NPR. "Or 'it's only mild' or 'it's not going to have a big effect.'" In nearly every case, the government was dead wrong, Evans said. NPR looked at the example he laid out in his 1987 book about the 1892 cholera outbreak in Hamburg, Germany, which killed about 10,000 of the port city's 800,000 residents. NPR summarized some key points:

The German city-state was run by merchant families who put trade and economy above residents' welfare. ... Hamburg's leaders claimed cholera was spread by an invisible vapor no government could hope to prevent. But in August 1892, the excrement of a Russian migrant ill with cholera ended up in the Elbe River, which the city drew on for its municipal water. ...

Hamburg's government waited six days after discovering that people were dying from cholera to tell anyone. By then, thousands were ill. ... A year after the cholera outbreak, Hamburg's fed-up citizenry voted their incompetent businessmen leaders out of office. They replaced the merchants with leaders who belonged to the Social Democrats, a working-class party that prioritized science and health over profit. [NPR]

Merchants were also blamed in the Great Plague of Marseille, the last major outbreak of the bubonic plague in Western Europe

In 1720 Marseille allowed a ship from plague-ridden Cyprus into port, under pressure from merchants who wanted the goods and didn’t want to wait for the usual quarantine. More than half the population of Marseille died in the next two years. https://t.co/IDapJhFhzM pic.twitter.com/vovtuQ1s7o
— Tim Stearns (@StearnsLab) April 25, 2020


Luckily, science has come a long way in the past 130 years. Politics? Maybe not. Peter Weber

Bubonic Plague (article) | Khan Academy

https://www.khanacademy.org › ... › Disease and demography

The bubonic plague - named the Black Death by later historians - was caused by ... The 1330s outbreak also spread west across Central Asia via traders using the Silk Road. ... Note how much of Europe was linked via trade routes. ... From the broader perspective of 

world history, the real takeaway from the Black Death is ...

Plague time: Simon Schama on what history tells us ...

https://www.ft.com › content

Apr 10, 2020 - At the end of 1665, after bubonic plague had taken off a quarter of ... His more austere friend, also a diarist, John Evelyn, Commissioner for ... that epidemics are the great re-setters of history, more formative even ... When the last major  ...

1320: Section 6: The Black Death

www.usu.edu › markdamen › chapters › 06PLAGUE

Worse yet, the climate of Europe was for reasons which are still unclear ... The Black Death is the single most significant disease in Western civilization to ... Yet, it was, in fact, not the first time bubonic plague had raised an angry hand to Europe. ... of its impact on human history and the course the disease took in the 1300's.

Great Plague of Marseille - Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Great_Plague_of_Marseille

The Great Plague of Marseille was the last major outbreak of bubonic plague in western Europe. Arriving in Marseille, France in 1720, the disease killed a total ...

Missing: blamed ‎| Must include: blamed

Read the CDC Coronavirus Document the White House Didn’t Want You to See

Jamie Ross, Erin Banco, The Daily Beast•May 7, 2020

When the nation’s most-respected infectious-disease investigators take the time to write down some advice as the president rushes to reopen the country during a raging pandemic, it seems only sensible that you’d listen very carefully to what they have to say.

But, according to a report from the Associated Press, the White House decided to block the publication of this 17-page document from a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention team. It lays out exactly what measures restaurants, schools, child-care facilities, and other public places should take if they decide to reopen their doors in the coming weeks.

The report, titled “Guidance for Implementing the Opening Up America Again Framework,” was written to help all kinds of people such as religious leaders, business owners, teachers, and local officials as the president and some state leaders rush to reopen.

The Daily Beast reported on the contents of the document last month. As of late April, the CDC, in coordination with the Federal Emergency Management Agency, had finalized the guidelines. The document, officials said at the time, was incredibly intricate and showed how states could begin to open summer camps, restaurants, bars and religious centers. Officials inside the CDC said they had been working on the guidelines for several weeks and anticipated that the White House would release them to states in the following days.

The Associated Press reported that the document had been slated for publication last Friday—but that scientists at the CDC were then told by the White House that it “would never see the light of day.”

Well, they were wrong—here it is.

It’s not clear why the White House decided to block its publication. Some of the report’s advice appears on federal websites, but the guidance in the report is much more detailed and tailored to different types of establishments. The White House published its own “Opening Up America Again” advice last month, but its guidance is much more general than the CDC team’s forensic document.

A source said to be close to the White House’s coronavirus task force reportedly told AP that White House officials were reluctant to offer such specific advice to people because they believe different parts of the country will need different advice depending on how hard they have been knocked back by the coronavirus pandemic. As of Thursday morning, more than 73,000 Americans have been reported to have died from the virus, according to numbers from Johns Hopkins University.

As the document shows, the CDC’s guidance sets out exactly what precautions people should take when reopening schools, restaurants, summer camps, churches, and day-care centers, among other establishments. It also includes detailed flow charts designed to be used by local officials so they’re prepared for difficult scenarios after reopening, such as if an employee becomes sick.

In specific advice for restaurants and bars, the report states that owners should install sneeze guards at cash registers to protect their staff, and completely avoid having buffets, salad bars, and shared drink stations. It also says that tables should be spaced at least six feet apart and encourages the use of digital apps to let diners know when their table is ready so they don’t need to handle a buzzer device that may not be clean.

Marcus Plescia, chief medical officer of the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials, told AP: “You can say that restaurants can open and you need to follow social-distancing guidelines. But restaurants want to know, ‘What does that look like?’ States would like more guidance.”

Despite the White House’s best efforts, they now have it.

Trump administration buries detailed CDC advice on reopening

JASON DEAREN and MIKE STOBBE, Associated Press•May 6, 2020

Report: CDC reopening guide shelved by Trump administration

GAINESVILLE, Fla. (AP) — The Trump administration shelved a document created by the nation's top disease investigators with step-by-step advice to local authorities on how and when to reopen restaurants and other public places during the still-raging coronavirus outbreak.

The 17-page report by a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention team, titled “Guidance for Implementing the Opening Up America Again Framework,” was researched and written to help faith leaders, business owners, educators and state and local officials as they begin to reopen.

It was supposed to be published last Friday, but agency scientists were told the guidance “would never see the light of day,” according to a CDC official. The official was not authorized to talk to reporters and spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity.

The AP obtained a copy from a second federal official who was not authorized to release it. The guidance was described in AP stories last week, prior to the White House decision to shelve it.

The Trump administration has been closely controlling the release of guidance and information during the pandemic spurred by a new coronavirus that scientists are still trying to understand, with the president himself leading freewheeling daily briefings until last week.

Traditionally, it's been the CDC's role to give the public and local officials guidance and science-based information during public health crises. During this one, however, the CDC has not had a regular, pandemic-related news briefing in nearly two months. CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield has been a member of the White House coronavirus task force, but largely absent from public appearances.

The dearth of real-time, public information from the nation’s experts has struck many current and former government health officials as dangerous.

“CDC has always been the public health agency Americans turn to in a time of crisis,” said Dr. Howard Koh, a Harvard professor and former health official in the Obama administration during the H1N1 swine flu pandemic in 2009. “The standard in a crisis is to turn to them for the latest data and latest guidance and the latest press briefing. That has not occurred, and everyone sees that.”

The Trump administration has instead sought to put the onus on states to handle COVID-19 response. This approach to managing the pandemic has been reflected in President Donald Trump’s public statements, from the assertion that he isn't responsible for the country’s lackluster early testing efforts, to his description last week of the federal government’s role as a “supplier of last resort” for states in need of testing aid.

A person close to the White House’s coronavirus task force said the CDC documents were never cleared by CDC leadership for public release. The person said that White House officials have refrained from offering detailed guidance for how specific sectors should reopen because the virus is affecting various parts of the country differently. The person spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.

The rejected reopening guidance was described by one of the federal officials as a touchstone document that was to be used as a blueprint for other groups inside the CDC who are creating the same type of instructional materials for other facilities.

The guidance contained detailed advice for making site-specific decisions related to reopening schools, restaurants, summer camps, churches, day care centers and other institutions. It had been widely shared within the CDC and included detailed “decision trees,” flow charts to be used by local officials to think through different scenarios. One page of the document can be found on the CDC website via search engines, but it did not appear to be linked to any other CDC pages.

Some of the report’s suggestions already appear on federal websites. But the guidance offered specific, tailored recommendations for reopening in one place.

For example, the report suggested restaurants and bars should install sneeze guards at cash registers and avoid having buffets, salad bars and drink stations. Similar tips appear on the CDC’s site and a Food and Drug Administration page.

But the shelved report also said that as restaurants start seating diners again, they should space tables at least 6 feet (1.8 meters) apart and try to use phone app technology to alert a patron when their table is ready to avoid touching and use of buzzers. That's not on the CDC's site now.

“States and local health departments do need guidance on a lot of the challenges around the decision to reopen,” said Dr. Marcus Plescia, chief medical officer of the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials. “You can say that restaurants can open and you need to follow social distancing guidelines. But restaurants want to know, ‘What does that look like?’”

The White House’s own “Opening Up America Again” guidelines released last month were more vague than the CDC’s unpublished report. They instructed state and local governments to reopen in accordance with federal and local “regulations and guidance" and to monitor employees for symptoms of COVID-19. The White House guidance also included advice developed earlier in the pandemic that remains important like social distancing and encouraging working from home.

At a briefing Wednesday, White House spokeswoman Kayleigh McEnany echoed the administration's stance that states are most responsible for their own COVID-19 response: “We’ve consulted individually with states, but as I said, it’s (a) governor-led effort. It’s a state-led effort on ... which the federal government will consult. And we do so each and every day.”

The CDC is hearing daily from state and county health departments looking for scientifically valid information with which to make informed decisions.

Still, behind the scenes, CDC scientists like those who produced the guidance for “Opening Up America Again″ are working to get information to local governments. The agency still employs hundreds of the world’s most respected epidemiologists and doctors, who in times of crisis are looked to for their expertise, said former CDC director Tom Frieden. People have clicked on the CDC's coronavirus website more than 1.2 billion times.

States that directly reach out to the CDC can tap guidance that’s been prepared but that the White House has not released.

“I don’t think that any state feels that the CDC is deficient. It’s just the process of getting stuff out,” Plescia said.

___

Stobbe reported from New York. Associated Press writers Darlene Superville and Zeke Miller in Washington contributed to this report.

A Place in the U.S. With No COVID-19? 

Look to American Samoa.

right click to enlarge


Simon Romero,The New York Times•May 7, 2020

The coronavirus death toll in the United States is climbing past 70,000, with thousands of new cases every day. But there is still one part of the country without a single confirmed case, much less a fatality: American Samoa, a palm-fringed Polynesian archipelago that has sealed itself off for nearly two months from the outside world.

Other U.S. islands lost their early battles to keep the infection out. But American Samoa’s success so far has been no accident, public health officials say. The territory moved swiftly to halt nearly all incoming flights, rapidly boosted testing capability and took advantage of social distancing strategies that had already been adopted in response to a measles outbreak at the end of last year.

The enduring trauma of the 1918 influenza pandemic, which left American Samoa relatively unscathed but wiped out a fifth of the population of neighboring independent Samoa, has also influenced aggressive anti-contagion moves at each stage of the crisis.

“Life in our bubble is somewhat unique compared to the rest of the world,” said Bishop Peter Brown, leader of the Roman Catholic church in American Samoa. Church services were quickly shut down when the coronavirus began its spread across the United States, he said.

Schools had been preparing to emerge from a measles closure in effect from December through early March when a “continuing” public health emergency was declared, effective on March 23.

“Apart from that, life is pretty normal, but supplies are somewhat sparse with shipping restricted,” Brown said. He added that many American Samoans were anxiously following the surging death toll on the mainland. “They need the help more than us,” he said.

The 55,000 people in the territory have been allowed to go to bars, nightclubs and restaurants, albeit in smaller numbers over the past month, with a limit of 10 customers at a time. Civil servants are working part time but have not stopped going into offices. The largest private employer, a tuna cannery with more than 2,000 workers, has continued to hum along.

In telephone interviews, text messages and social media postings, people in American Samoa described experiencing a surreal mixture of relief, isolation and apprehension over what the future holds for the territory, which lies about 1,600 miles from New Zealand and 2,200 miles from Hawaii.

“Since flights were suspended in March, the silence of the skies is eerie,” said Monica Miller, the news director at an operator of radio stations in the territory.

Eying the spread of the virus in parts of Asia, Gov. Lolo M. Moliga moved assertively weeks before some of his counterparts elsewhere in the United States to shield his constituents from the pandemic.

In early March, Moliga halted the territory’s two weekly flights to and from Hawaii, then did the same with flights to Apia, the capital of neighboring Samoa. Since then, one of the territory’s only lifelines is a cargo flight arriving with medical supplies and food once a week from Hawaii.

The territorial government also quickly formed a coronavirus task force in March, introducing a variety of moderate social distancing measures in addition to the church and school closures. For instance, public gatherings in bingo halls and theaters were suspended, and the territorial correctional facility was closed for visitation.

At the time, anxiety was running high over the potential for the virus to devastate American Samoa. Large parts of the population grapple with conditions that could heighten the risk of dying from COVID-19, such as diabetes, hypertension and obesity.

Moreover, the territory has a shortage of medical workers and only one hospital, the Lyndon B. Johnson Tropical Medical Center, with capacity to treat about 10 coronavirus patients at a time.

When suspected cases began emerging in March, officials expressed fear about having no way to analyze coronavirus tests except by submitting them to the nearest American public health laboratory, thousands of miles away in Hawaii, and waiting for the results.

“It was a really frightening and scary time, like flying blind in a storm,” said Larry Sanitoa, a member of the Fono, American Samoa’s bicameral legislature, and chairman of a nursing home called Hope House.

None of the tests came back positive. But tension over a sense of helplessness was building in the territory, which the United States annexed in 1900 while assembling an empire in the Pacific; Germany, then New Zealand, took possession of neighboring Samoa, part of the same archipelago.

The people of the territory are U.S. nationals, not citizens, meaning they can fight in the armed forces and live in the rest of the United States. But they are ineligible to hold many public jobs and cannot vote for president or run for office outside American Samoa.

In a letter to President Donald Trump in March, Moliga, the Democratic governor, said the territory needed assistance and was doing its part to help other Americans, including the hundreds who were aboard the Norwegian Jewel cruise ship when it was allowed to refuel in American Samoa after being turned away at ports in Fiji and French Polynesia.

Since then, the territory has obtained at least $35 million of federal aid to deal with the pandemic, along with more than 1,000 test kits and a machine to analyze them.

Iulogologo Joseph Pereira, the head of American Samoa’s coronavirus task force, said the dozens of tests performed since the machine arrived in mid-April were all negative.

With those results and no signs of local transmission of the virus, the territory remains the only part of the United States that is not under a major disaster declaration. Pereira said the territory’s response to recent disease outbreaks — Zika in 2016, dengue in 2017 and 2018, and measles in 2019 — influenced decisions early in the crisis.

2020 25 cent Memorial Coin for American Samoa with the Samoan Fruit Bat
see more below


“We’ve been preparing for the big one for some time,” he said.

Health officials were already on high alert after the measles outbreak in December, and watched with some horror as 83 people, the vast majority children younger than 5, were killed by the disease in neighboring Samoa.

Swift action during that outbreak prevented deaths from measles, evoking for many in American Samoa the response to the influenza pandemic a century ago. At that time, New Zealand, which ruled what is now independent Samoa, allowed the virus to spread. The flu killed about 8,500 in the colony in just two months.

In contrast, the naval governor of American Samoa isolated the territory, much like leaders are doing now. American Samoa was one of the few places in the world to emerge from the 1918 pandemic without any flu deaths.

“Stringent measures kept American Samoa free of deaths then, and we cannot afford to deviate from the same today,” said Tamari Mulitalo Cheung, a writer who teaches at American Samoa Community College.

Being a far-flung archipelago in the Pacific may help. Other places in Oceania that have taken measures similar to American Samoa, including the Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and independent Samoa, also remain among the world’s few places without confirmed coronavirus cases.

The virus has reached other parts of the United States in the Pacific, though with less devastating effects than parts of the mainland. Guam has had five deaths, while the virus has killed 17 people in Hawaii and two in the Northern Mariana Islands.

In Puerto Rico, the most populous U.S. territory, the virus has killed 99 people. Early action by Puerto Rican authorities, including imposing curfews and shutting businesses, is thought to have staved off a much higher death toll.

At this point, some in American Samoa are urging the authorities to relax some measures.

In a session of the legislature last week, Vice Speaker Fetu Fetui noted that he had already seen crowds at banks, restaurants and government offices. He questioned whether distancing measures were being broadly enforced, and called for an easing of restrictions.

There are also a few exceptions to American Samoa’s self-isolation. In addition to the cargo ships that are still allowed to dock and unload at the port, a private jet carrying three engineers for StarKist was permitted in April to land at the airport in Pago Pago, the capital, for repairs at the tuna cannery. The engineers had previously tested negative for the virus, said Pereira of the task force.

He insisted that the authorities were “erring on the side of caution.” Last week, the governor said that current restrictions would be maintained at least until June.

More American Samoans live outside the territory, in places like New Zealand, Hawaii and the mainland United States, than in the territory, making the travel restrictions especially challenging for families that find themselves separated.

“It’s extremely difficult,” said Eddie Vaouli, 42, an American Samoan who has been stranded in Hawaii since March 20. “It’s expensive in Honolulu.”

Some in the territory are also dealing with financial fallout. Donna Gurr, the owner of the largest flower shop in American Samoa, said her business volume had declined by about 50% since the distancing measures were introduced. Her store relies heavily on sales of leis for church services every Sunday.

Still, Gurr said she approved of the government’s pandemic response. “When and if this virus arrives, it will be devastating on us,” she said.

Going further, Gurr said she did not feel too isolated at the moment. “Maybe it hasn’t been long enough,” she said. “If this lasts for a year I could feel different. But right now, I feel safe and secure.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

© 2020 The New York Times Com

1st America the Beautiful quarters of 2020 features a fruit bat mother and her pup
The quarter will be released in February 2020.
By ABC News 9 January 2020


Samoan fruit bats featured on new quarter

Brad Ryan said his grandma had spent most of her life in a small Ohio town, so in 2015, they went on their first road trip together. Since then, they've traveled 25,000 miles across 38 states.

Keep an eye out for a shiny new quarter with a raised image of fruit bats and be careful not to let the coin fly out of your wallet or pocket.

As part of the U.S. Mint's America the Beautiful Quarters Program, the new National Parks quarter dollar celebrates American Samoa and on the relief features a mother fruit bat and her pup hanging upside down.





One of the new America the Beautiful Quarters for 2020 showcases the National Park of American Samoa.One of the new America the Beautiful Quarters for 2020 showcases the National Park of American Samoa.United States Mint

The first special edition coin of the new year will be released on Feb. 3.

"The image evokes the remarkable care and energy that this species puts into their offspring," the U.S. Mint wrote in its description. "The design is intended to promote awareness to the species’ threatened status due to habitat loss and commercial hunting. The National Park of American Samoa is the only park in the United States that is home to the Samoan fruit bat."

Since 2010, the U.S. Mint has issued 56 quarter-dollar coins that feature designs which depict national parks and other national sites as part of its America the Beautiful Quarters Program.
MORE: 'Grandma Joy' and her grandson share snapshots of America as they try to visit all 61 national parks

Some flew to social media to weigh in on the announcement.

If you use a Bat Quarter in the Bram Stoker's Dracula pinball machine you get a free game. https://t.co/qU3N3F28Lu— Max Nestorowich (@MMNestorowich) January 8, 2020

Others wondered why the Harriet Tubman $20 bill hasn't been issued, but we will now have bat quarters. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin testified in May 2019 that the new $20 bill will not be redesigned in 2020.

Still impatiently waiting for the Harriet Tubman $20, but I admit... the Bat Quarter brings me joy. https://t.co/PPicGN0FU4— Erin B Lindsay (@erinblindsay) January 8, 2020

After the fruit bat quarter, there will be four more coins made by the U.S. Mint to represent other national parks.




One of the new America the Beautiful Quarters for 2020 showcases Salt River Bay National Historical Park and Ecological Preserve.One of the new America the Beautiful Quarters for 2020 showcases Salt River Bay National Historical Park and Ecological Preserve.United States Mint

A coin that embossed with an image of Weir Farm National Historic Site in Connecticut will debut in April, Salt River Bay National Historical Park and Ecological Preserve in the U.S. Virgin Islands will be released in June, Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park in Vermont will be released at the end of August and a Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve in Kansas coin will be the final specialty 25 cent piece of the 2020 collection in November.

A llama named Winter could be the key to fighting the coronavirus 

Preliminary research suggests a tiny particle in llama blood can stop the coronavirus


Llama antibodies could neutralize the novel coronavirus, research suggests. 

MarketWatch photo illustration/iStockphoto, Tim CoppensPublished: May 6, 2020 By Nicole Lyn Pesce

Alpaca your bags, coronavirus.

The race to find effective coronavirus treatments has led to an unlikely hero: a 4-year-old Belgian llama named Winter, whose antibodies show promise in blocking the novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19 from infecting cells.

Researchers from the University of Texas at Austin, the National Institutes of Health and Ghent University in Belgium began researching llama blood four years ago while looking for antibodies to fight the 2003 SARS virus and the 2012 MERS virus, which are also coronaviruses. And members of the camel family, such as llamas and alpacas, produce two types of antibodies to detect bacteria and viruses: one similar to human antibodies, as well as smaller antibodies called nanobodies that are about a quarter of the size. And these nanobodies are not only easier for scientists to work with, but they can also be nebulized and used in an inhaler.Related:These 21 companies are working on coronavirus treatments or vaccines — here’s where things stand

So what is it about tiny llama antibodies that make them a coronavirus killer? The coronavirus gets its name for having a corona, or crown shape, which is formed by protein spikes that let the virus break into healthy host cells. But the preliminary research finds that the petite antibodies from Winter’s blood (which were used to engineer a new antibody) can bind onto the coronavirus spikes, and block the virus from infecting cells.

“This is one of the first antibodies known to neutralize SARS-CoV-2,” said Jason McLellan, associate professor of molecular biosciences at UT Austin and co-senior author, in a statement.


The research team reported its early findings in the journal Cell on Tuesday. The paper is a “pre-proof” that has been peer-reviewed, but is still undergoing final formatting.


Meet Winter, the 4-year-old llama fighting COVID-19. Tim Coppens

The researchers are preparing for preclinical studies in animals such as hamsters or nonhuman primates next, and hope to advance to human trials by the end of the year. The goal is to develop a treatment to help people soon after becoming infected with the virus. Bert Schepens, who led the Belgian arm of the research team, told Reuters that negotiations are under way with pharmaceutical companies.

Related:The FDA tightens rules around antibody tests as companies talk up their value

“Vaccines have to be given a month or two before infection to provide protection,” McLellan explained in a statement. “With antibody therapies, you’re directly giving somebody the protective antibodies and so, immediately after treatment, they should be protected. The antibodies could also be used to treat somebody who is already sick to lessen the severity of the disease.”

Winter was first drafted to battle coronaviruses in 2016, when at nine months old she was immunized with spike proteins from MERS and SARS to create antibodies against those diseases. Researchers then drew her blood and isolated her antibodies. One neutralized SARS, and another showed potential for neutralizing MERS. She’s currently living on a farm in the Belgian countryside with about 130 other llamas and alpacas.

As of Wednesday morning, there were 3.68 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 globally, and at least 257,793 deaths, according to data aggregated by Johns Hopkins University. More than 1.21 million people have recovered. The U.S. continues to have the highest case toll in the world at 1.20 million, and the highest death count at 71,078.  

In the quest for a coronavirus treatment, scientists are turning to a 4-year-old llama named WinterBusiness Insider•May 6, 2020

A llama named Winter is seen in this undated photo released

 by the VIB-UGent Center for Medical Biotechnology in Ghent,

 Belgium on May 5, 2020.
VIB-UGent Center for Medical Biotechnology/Handout via Reuters
Research from Belgian and US scientists suggests that a four-year-old llama named Winter and 130 other llamas may hold the key to neutralizing the effects of the virus that causes COVID-19.


Scientists from Belgium's VIB-UGent Center for Medical Biotechnology and the University of Texas at Austin found that Winter was successfully immunized from the spike proteins of the SARS and MERS virus by producing a special kind of camelid antibody.

The findings could be applied to the COVID-19 coronavirus — which is a cousin of the SARS virus — and offer early promise as to the potential Winter's blood and antibodies hold in helping treat COVID-19.

The research from the llama studies is still in preliminary stages, however, as scientists are still conducting preclinical trials on hamsters, The Washington Post reported

A four-year-old llama named Winter may hold the key to finding a way to treat the coronavirus that causes the respiratory disease COVID-19, according to US and Belgian scientists studying llama antibodies.

They published their findings in the science journal Cell on Tuesday, which found that Winter and 130 other llamas on the research farm produce a special kind of camelid antibody that may offer an early promise to find a way to neutralize the virus, known as SARS-CoV-2.

The researchers include those from Belgium's VIB-UGent Center for Medical Biotechnology as well as the University of Texas at Austin.

The research stemmed back to 2016; the researchers were studying camelid antibody response to the 2003 SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) virus — which is a cousin of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19 — as well as 2012 MERS (Middle East respiratory syndrome) virus.

They found that Winter was immunized from the viruses, as llamas can produce antibodies slightly different than the ones humans can produce, which allow it to tackle the spikes of a coronavirus.

Daniel Wrapp, another researcher on the study, told The Washington Post that they were in the midst of wrapping up the SARS/MERS study when the coronavirus outbreak began. By linking two copies of antibodies that could hinder the SARS virus, they were able to find a new antibody that would bind to and neutralize the novel coronavirus.

"The work was a side project in 2016. We thought maybe this was interesting," Xavier Saelens, who co-authored the study from the Belgian side of the collaboration, told Reuters. "Then the new virus came and it became potentially more crucial, more important."

As the race to find a coronavirus treatment continues and the distribution of potential vaccines is at least a year out, antibody research has become a point of interest to counteract the effects of the virus itself.

The research from the llama studies is still in preliminary stages, however. Scientists are still conducting preclinical trials on hamsters, The Post reported. Additional studies are also necessary to determine if it is safe to inject llama antibodies into humans.

"There is still a lot of work to do to try to bring this into the clinic," Saelens told The New York Times. "If it works, llama Winter deserves a statue."

Read the original article on Business Insider

Belgian, U.S. scientists look to llama in search for COVID-19 treatment
CAMELS CARRIED MERS

Reuters•May 6, 2020

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - A llama called Winter could prove useful in the hunt for a treatment for COVID-19, according to U.S. and Belgian scientists who have identified a tiny particle that appears to block the new coronavirus.

The scientists, from Belgium's VIB-UGent center for medical biotechnology and the University of Texas at Austin, published research on Tuesday in the journal Cell, with the llama in Belgium central to their studies.

The group began four years ago looking into antibodies that might counter the SARS virus, which spread in 2003, and the MERS virus that flared up in 2012.

"The work was a side project in 2016. We thought maybe this was interesting," said Xavier Saelens, joint leader of the Belgian part of the collaboration. "Then the new virus came and it became potentially more crucial, more important."

Winter, the llama, was given safe versions of the SARS and MERS viruses and samples of its blood were later taken.

Llamas and other members of camel family are distinct in creating standard antibodies and smaller antibodies, with which scientists can more easily work.

The Belgian part of the research team, also led by Bert Schepens, identified fragments of the smaller antibodies, known as nanobodies, to see which bound most strongly to the virus.

Saelens describes the new coronavirus as the cousin of the SARS virus. Both have a corona, or crown, shape with protein spikes, onto which an antibody can latch.

The team intend to begin tests on animals, with a view to allowing trials with humans to begin by the end of the year. Saelens said negotiations were under way with pharmaceutical companies.

The research is not the first into nanobodies derived from camels or llamas. French group Sanofi paid 3.9 billion euros ($4.23 billion) in 2018 to buy Ghent-based nanobody specialist
company Ablynx. ($1 = 0.9227 euros)

Llamas may hold the key to an effective coronavirus treatment

Kathryn Krawczyk,The Week•May 6, 2020

Llamas: They're more than just the cuddly creatures that inspired everything T.J. Maxx sells.

These squishable-when-they're-not-spitting camelids hold antibodies that could be the key to treating COVID-19, scientists suggested in a study published Tuesday in the journal Cell. Llamas' antibodies are known for their ability to neutralize viruses, and when tested against the new coronavirus, proved effective in doing so once again, the study says.

While humans produce just one set of antibodies when they get sick, llamas make two: one that's around the size of human antibodies, and one that's much smaller. Those smaller antibodies are usually better at accessing the tiny holes in viruses' spike proteins and eradicating them, The New York Times describes.

So scientists turned to a dark brown llama named Winter, who lives in Belgium and was used to develop treatments for the SARS and MERS viruses back when she was nine months old. Winter, now 4 years old, was injected with spike proteins from the new coronavirus. After six weeks, scientists took a blood sample from Winter, and found that her antibodies appeared to neutralize COVID-19 — a first for any living creature.

Scientists now suggest linking two tiny llama antibodies together and safely distributing them to humans could be an effective way of treating coronavirus and mitigating its devastating effects. 

Find the whole study here.

Six different doctors came in': Suspended nurses share why they protested hospital conditions amid coronavirus

Adriana Belmonte Associate Editor, Yahoo Finance•May 6, 2020
With over 3 million cases worldwide and over one-third just in the U.S., the coronavirus pandemic has put a heavy burden on health care workers across the country. Weeks after the outbreak emerged in the U.S., certain hospitals still grapple with a lack of personal protective equipment (PPE) amid an overwhelming number of patients and no clear end in sight.

Jack Cline and Michael Gulick were part of a group of 10 nurses who were suspended with pay from Providence St. John’s Health Center in Santa Monica, Calif. The nurses refused to work without being provided N95 masks like the physicians they were working with.

“All we were provided prior to this were the flimsy surgical masks which don’t provide respiratory protection,” Gulick, a registered nurse in the hospital’s medical surgical unit, told Yahoo Finance. “And there’s increasing evidence that shows airborne transmission is a part of how this virus can be spread. So airborne and contact protection is needed.”

Hospital personnel stand outside Providence St. John's Medical Center in Santa Monica, Calif. (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez,File)

Unlike surgical masks, N95 masks are tight-fitting and filter out at least 95% of airborne particles, according to the CDC, which are how coronavirus is transmitted. Because of this, the masks are in short supply as people across the country scramble to obtain them to protect themselves against the virus.

“Six different doctors came in and told the nurses not to go into these rooms without having an N95 mask on,” Cline, who works in the same unit as Gulick, told Yahoo Finance. “So we were scared because they were telling us one thing, the hospital was telling us something different. And we noticed all the doctors that went in there had N95 masks on.”

A worker at a Honeywell International Inc. factory works on N95 masks May 5, 2020, in Phoenix, Arizona, during a visit by the US president. (Photo by Brendan Smialowski / AFP) (Photo by BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP via Getty Images)More

“I work at another hospital and they were doing that all along,” he added. “It seems like St. John’s were doing the minimum safety standards.”

Patricia Aidem, the public relations director for the hospital, confirmed that the nurses had been placed on suspension with pay. She referred to a statement from the hospital which said:

“During conversations with the nurses, we explained three times that refusing to care for their very sick patients could result in disciplinary action... We take this issue very seriously. This type of action, by any caregiver, requires investigation... Nothing is more important to us than the safety of our patients and caregivers. Nothing. ... Saint John’s – along with most hospitals across the United States – has been issuing PPE in accordance with CDC and other expert guidelines since the pandemic began.”

The U.S. has over 1.2 million cases of coronavirus. 

(Graphic: David Foster/Yahoo Finance)

The walkout

After one of their fellow nurses tested positive for COVID-19, this gave them the motivation to confront hospital administrators with their requests for N95 masks.

“It was on Thursday, April 9, that we started our shift, and there were about eight of us working on the unit at the time,” Cline recalled. “We had all received news of one of our coworkers testing positive. The doctors that were coming onto our unit that day… they were giving us directives and were giving us their clinical judgment, in saying that we should not be taking care of these patients without being provided an N95 mask.”

He continued: “They told us to demand them from our nursing leadership and if they don’t provide them to us, to consult our union, because they’re there to protect us for issues like these. Because they said, ‘we’re not going into these rooms without an N95 mask. And if you guys are taking care of them for a 12-hour shift, there’s no reason why you guys shouldn’t be provided the same level of protection.”

Nurses at Providence Saint John's Health Center in Santa Monica, Calif., on April 9, raise their fists in solidarity after telling managers they can't care for COVID-19 patients without N95 respirator masks to protect themselves.(Lizabeth Baker Wade/AP)More

The group approached their nursing leaderships asking for the masks, and were denied, with the administration citing CDC guidelines at the time.

“We said, ‘Well, we can’t safely take care of these patient assignments without being provided an N95 respirator,’” Gulick said. “And so after that, they called hospital administration and we called our union representation … And then one by one, they called us into the office and they gave us basically a scripted order that said: ‘We’re giving you a direct order to take over these patient assignments. If you fail to comply, it’ll be considered patient abandonment and negligence, and a potential reporting to your State Board of Licensure.’”

Gulick and Cline both emphasized that they were not abandoning their patients, but rather felt like they could not properly treat them without proper masks.

The coronavirus has killed over 250,000 people around the world.

 (Graphic: David Foster/Yahoo Finance)

Although Providence St. John’s said their decisions were based on the PPE shortage, Gulick said that the nurses suspect the hospital has an adequate supply of N95 respirators.

“We don’t know for certain, because they’re not completely transparent with us,” he said. “But we see that other clinicians have them, that other people have access to them. So we know that they certainly have stock of them and from what we understand, that according to the CDC guidelines, hospitals should only be using a reprocessed or decontaminated mask if their own available supply of new N95 masks is completely exhausted, and that there’s completely none of them.”

The PPE shortage has posed a serious challenge for front line workers across the country. Health care workers at some hospitals were reportedly being asked to reuse disposable masks and gloves or make their own masks. There are severe shortages of N95 masks, which can properly protect these workers treating patients. The CDC said that these workers could use homemade masks, like bandannas or scarves, as a “last resort.”

Nurse Yvette Laugere adjusts her N95 mask while working at a newly opened free Covid-19 testing site in Houston. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

‘I didn’t want to take that home to him’

Aside from being worried about their own health and well-being, both nurses worried about bringing the virus back to their homes.

A CDC report found that more than 9,000 health care workers have tested positive for coronavirus.

Gulick, who is married and has a 2-year-old daughter, said that he took “very meticulous precautions” to decontaminate himself after each shift before even interacting with his family.

For Cline, there were several risk factors involved. Aside from being over 50 years old and being a brittle diabetic who has had multiple heart surgeries, his roommate is HIV positive, making him very immunocompromised.

“I didn’t want to take that home to him,” Cline said.

Hospital personnel stand outside Providence St. John's Medical Center in Santa Monica, Calif. (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez, File)

‘They won’t listen to the nurses’
Although the hospital changed its guidelines shortly after their suspensions, Gulick and Cline both criticized the actions of the hospital administration for their role.

“They won’t listen to the nurses,” Cline said. “Whenever there are patient safety issues and we go to the hospital and we tell them that something’s not safe, they won’t listen to the nurses at all. They just continue to do what management thinks is best.”

Linda Silva, a nurse's assistant, poses for a portrait in the Queens borough of New York. (AP Photo/Frank Franklin II)

“And it’s also frustrating because Providence Hospital is a multi-billion-dollar corporation that can definitely afford to buy N95 masks, and they should have had more available,” he added. “About six months ago, they took our central supply out of our hospital and they made it central for the whole region. There are four or five hospitals. So what we do when we need supplies and we don’t have them available, we have to order them and we will and a lot of times, we need them now and they won’t come until the next day.”

Gulick singled out the administration for a lack of transparency, but also said that the federal government needs to step up and fully enact the Defense Protection Act to ramp up production of PPE.

“Those things need to be stabilized first before all these people can even think about reopening the government and going back to their normal lives,” he said.

Adriana is a reporter and editor for Yahoo Finance. Follow her on Twitter @adrianambells.

Group of Senate Republicans Urges Trump to Suspend 

‘All Guest Worker Visas’ Until Unemployment Returns to ‘Normal Levels’

AT THE WAGE LEVELS THEY ARE PAID NO AMERICAN WILL DO THE JOB

Tobias Hoonhout,National Review•May 7, 2020

MILLIONAIRE PARASITES

A group of GOP Senators is asking President Trump to ramp up his recent “pause” on immigration to include a prohibition on guest-worker visas, citing rising levels of American unemployment amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Senator Tom Cotton (R., Ark.), joined by Senators Josh Hawley (R., Mo.), Ted Cruz (R., Texas), and Chuck Grassley (R., Iowa) are requesting that the White House halt new guest-worker visas and all non-immigrant guest-worker visas, as well as a suspension of new non-immigrant guest-worker visas for 60 days or until American jobless numbers fall to “normal levels.”

“As we work toward recovery, we urge you to keep the American worker in mind and limit the number of unnecessary guest workers while American families and businesses get back on their feet,” the senators write in the letter.

While Trump announced a 60-day moratorium on immigration last month, the rule did not affect guest-worker programs, including EB-5 visas — which give immigrants green cards after a set amount of investment — H-2B visas for nonagricultural seasonal workers, H-1B visas for specialty occupation workers, and the country’s Optional Practical Training (OTP) program, which allows foreign students to work in the U.S. for 1-3 years after graduation.

The senators explain that EB-5 program “has long been plagued by scandal” and amounts to a “pay-for citizenship scheme in many cases.” They also argue that suspensions to OTP, H-1B, and H-2B will help those citizens who recently graduated high school or college and have entered a tough job market.

“Given the extreme lack of available jobs for American job-seekers as portions of our economy begin to reopen, it defies common sense to admit additional foreign guest workers to compete for such limited employment,” they explain.

Last week, the Department of Labor reported 3.8 million new jobless claims, bringing the total number of American seeing unemployment benefits to 30 million, or 18 percent of the total work force.

Opinion: How unemployed Americans can be put to work fighting the coronavirus pandemic

Army of volunteers can help with contact tracing in the battle to control COVID-19’s spread

Getty Images

Published: May 7, 2020 By Price V. Fishback and  Kris James Mitchener

It is natural to search for solutions to the coronavirus crisis by looking to the past — to the last time the U.S. witnessed a massive decline in output, income, and employment on an order of magnitude of what is expected for the second quarter of 2020.

The temptation might be to draw lessons from the New Deal, President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s response to the Great Depression, and to call for a raft of expansive Federal public programs. But to paraphrase a famous saying, “history rhymes, more than it repeats.”

Borrowing from the spirit of the New Deal, we propose a temporary program: CoVid Contactors (CVC) to carry out a vital next step in controlling the pandemic while opening the economy.

In this nationwide effort, people who are currently receiving the additional $600 per week in federal Pandemic Unemployment Assistance would volunteer to help public health officials in “contact tracing.” Once someone is diagnosed with COVID-19, public health experts agree that we need to quickly identify their “high risk” contacts and then follow up with additional testing.

Contact tracing is an old-school public health response that has been successfully used for decades to combat diseases that spread relatively easily, such as measles and AIDS. Contact tracing provides information to those in danger and does not call for digital companies to intrude on people’s privacy.

CVC workers could carry out interviews with the contacts of people who have tested positive for COVID-19, to help public health officials assess whether additional downstream testing or self-quarantining is needed. Using cheap and widely available headsets and database software that protects the privacy of those contacted, the CVC volunteers could be trained to work safely from home to reach out to contacts of those who tested positive.

Large numbers of people currently receive benefits in every county throughout the U.S. The CVC would be positioned to assist the roughly 8,000 contract tracers who currently work in county- and state health departments, and to cost-effectively fill a need for contract tracers that is estimated at between 100,000 and 300,000, based on the pandemic’s current dimensions.

The CVC proposal asks people to volunteer and work on an important public works project while receiving unemployment benefits. The CVC will be temporary and end when the unemployment crisis ends. The current federal subsidy of $600 per week for the unemployed ends on July 31. If we still need the CVC at that point, any new funds should be shifted to hiring people for the project part-time or full-time at market wages. That way people will have the appropriate incentives to return to their regular jobs.

Americans during the Great Depression saw work relief as a way to have the pride of work while receiving government benefits. We expect that Americans today who receive the federal boost along with normal unemployment will point with pride to their contribution to help solve the pandemic crisis.

How CVC would work and what it costs

• Who would work as tracers? Unemployed workers receiving the federal unemployment insurance benefit of $600 who choose to volunteer.

• Is this fair? First, it’s voluntary. Second, the Covid Contactors currently receive $600 per week in addition to the state’s regular unemployment benefit weekly payments. If they work 30 hours per week while receiving the payments, they will receive $20 per hour for their contact work and still receive the state’s normal unemployment benefits for being unemployed.

• Why should the unemployed do this work? “Seeking work” requirements have been waived until July 31, so presently, there is little incentive for many workers to look for jobs — especially since many jobs that have been lost in the past few months are not presently available. The battle against the pandemic requires an army of tracers. Public health officials are understaffed and have an immediate need for contact tracing.

• What is the “seeking work” requirement and why should it matter? To qualify for unemployment benefits, in normal times and recessions, workers must show that they are “ready and actively seeking employment.” It also states that “at a minimum, workers should be ready to accept work immediately if a job is offered to you.” CVC offers a way to help your country in a time of need.

• Won’t this crowd out private sector employment? No, the CVC program is temporary. This proposal aims to instill civic pride in people who want to work and are willing to work by employing them as temporary contact tracers. As the economy safely opens back up, workers will transition to looking for jobs in the private sector when the supplemental benefits end July 31. If tracing and testing is successful, the immediate demand for contact tracers will gradually decline and public health agencies can hire additional workers as needed and at private-sector wage rates. If they so choose, CVC volunteers would be trained and find themselves in a position to fill such vacancies.

• Do I have to work if I receive federal benefits? More than 30 million Americans have been added to unemployment insurance rolls in the last two months. If just 1% of them volunteer, we can meet the high-end of the estimated current demand for contact tracing.

• Are any additional funds needed? No. These benefits are already provisioned through the CARES Act. No additional funding is required until July 31.

Read:If post-coronavirus hiring practices don’t change, it will be devastating for many workers being laid off now

As states begin to open up their economies on a haphazard basis, the U.S. finds itself at a critical juncture in its fight against the coronavirus. Resources are needed to combat its spread and uncertainty over the future path of the pandemic is weighing down future economic activity. The CVC plan provides needed human resources to address an urgent public health priority in a sensible way and without adding to the economic burden states are bearing from the pandemic.

The virus is doing plenty of damage to the private sector now, and America needs to find ways to mitigate that damage. CVC is targeted and temporary, designed to aid in quarantining high-risk individuals while allowing the economy to operate more normally. Through contact tracing, CVC contributes to efforts to create a well-designed and concerted public health response to the next phase of combating the pandemic.

Price V. Fishback is Thomas R. Brown Professor of Economics at the Eller College of Business at the University of Georgia. Kris James Mitchener is Robert & Susan Finocchio Professor of Economics at the Leavey School of Business at Santa Clara University.

Jobless claims: Another 3.169 million Americans file for unemployment benefits

Heidi Chung Reporter, Yahoo Finance•May 7, 2020

Market participants got another pulse check on the U.S. labor market Thursday, as the world continues to grapple with the COVID-19 pandemic and ahead of the highly-anticipated April jobs report.

Another 3.169 million Americans filed for unemployment benefits in the week ending May 2, exceeding economists expectations for 3 million initial jobless claims. The prior week’s figure was revised higher to 3.846 million from the previously reported 3.839 million. So far over the past seven weeks, more than 33 million Americans have filed unemployment insurance claims.

Continuing claims, which lags initial jobless claims data by one week, totaled a record 22.65 million. The prior week’s 17.99 million continuing claims was revised higher to 18.01 million.

The weekly number of jobless claims has been steadily declining even as the cumulative number remains high.

“Initial jobless claims continued to moderate during the most recent week of data despite remaining at an extremely elevated level,” Nomura economist Lewis Alexander wrote in a note May 1. “Fiscal stimulus and the gradual re-opening of some industries and states should help the labor market stabilize further. That said, considerable strain remains, and we continue to expect the unemployment rate to reach almost 20% in Q2.”

Thursday’s weekly claims report comes ahead of the Bureau of Labor Statistic’s April jobs report and on the heels of the ADP employment report. Wednesday morning, the U.S. private sector lost 20.23 million jobs in April and was the worst loss in the report’s history, according to ADP.

“Job losses of this scale are unprecedented. The total number of job losses for the month of April alone was more than double the total jobs lost during the Great Recession,” ADP Research Institute Co-Head Ahu Yildirmaz said in a statement.

“Additionally, it is important to note that the report is based on the total number of payroll records for employees who were active on a company’s payroll through the 12th of the month. This is the same time period the Bureau of Labor and Statistics uses for their survey,” Yildirmaz added.

Though the ADP report is not always a reliable indicator of what the BLS report will illustrate, it does provide a bit of insight into the health of employment in the U.S.

“The report is a bit light on details of any potential methodological problems this month. The ADP counts anyone on the active payroll rather than just people who were paid during the month, which is the official non-farm payroll definition. Within many people put on temporary layoff, that could have created a discrepancy, with those people still on the active payroll, but not counted in the official non-farm payroll figures and also qualifying as unemployed in the other official household survey,” Capital Economics said in a note Wednesday.

Economists polled by Bloomberg expect 21.3 million jobs losses in April when the BLS releases its report Friday morning, down significantly from 701,000 job losses in March. The unemployment rate is estimated to have surged to 16% from 4.4% in the prior month.

“April jobs report should go down in infamy,” Bank of America economists said in a note Wednesday. “The April employment report will reveal unprecedented job losses as the economy has been shutdown to control the spread of COVID-19.” The firm projects 22 million job losses during the month amid the global pandemic.

One important thing to note with April’s jobs report is that there might be some discrepancies in the two surveys. A furloughed person, who is not working but has not been laid off, will be classified as unemployed or temporarily laid off in the household survey. However, if they were paid at any point during the establishment survey period, they will be classified as employed.

As of Thursday morning, there were 3.7 million confirmed coronavirus cases and 264,000 deaths globally, according to Johns Hopkins University data. In the U.S., there were 1.2 million cases and 73,000 deaths.

This post is developing. Please check back for updates.

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