Fauci doubts Russia's new vaccine

4 years ago 332

1 min ago

Australian state reports highest daily increase in coronavirus deaths

From CNN's Angus Watson in Sydney and Isaac Yee in Hong Kong

A member of the Australian Defence Force carries a batch of swab samples taken from members of the public at a drive-through coronavirus testing station in the Melbourne suburb of Fawkner on July 2. William West/AFP via Getty Images

Australia’s Victoria state recorded 21 new deaths from Covid-19 in the past 24 hours -- the largest single-day spike in fatalities since the pandemic began, the state's Department of Health and Human Services announced Wednesday.

The new casualties bring Victoria's total coronavirus death toll to 267.

The department also announced 410 new Covid-19 cases, raising the total number of infections in Victoria to 15,251.

39 min ago

Mexico reports nearly 1,000 new Covid-19 deaths

From journalist Karol Suarez in Mexico City

Mexico identified 926 new deaths from the novel coronavirus on Tuesday, taking the total number of fatalities to 53,929, the country's Health Ministry reported.

The country holds the third-highest coronavirus death toll in the world, after the United States and Brazil, according to Johns Hopkins University's tally.

Mexico's Health Ministry also recorded 6,686 new infections Tuesday, bringing the total number of cases to 492,522.

CNN is tracking worldwide coronavirus cases here:

12 min ago

New Zealand election date in doubt after new coronavirus cases emerge

From CNN's Isaac Yee

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern speaks to media during a press conference at Parliament on August 12, Wellington, New Zealand. Hagen Hopkins/Getty Images

New Zealand will defer the dissolution of Parliament "by at least a few days," which would allow it to reconvene if needed, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced at a news conference Wednesday.

The dissolution of Parliament was scheduled to take place on Wednesday in a key step toward holding a national election on September 19.

Ardern said that “no decision yet as you can imagine” has been taken regarding the postponement of the election.

The announcement comes after New Zealand confirmed four new locally transmitted Covid-19 cases Tuesday, breaking the 102-day streak the country had gone without recording a local infection.

All four of the cases were found within one household in South Auckland, and none of them had recently traveled outside of New Zealand, according to New Zealand's Director-General of Health Dr. Ashley Bloomfield.

Elderly homes closed: Ardern also announced Wednesday that all retirement homes in New Zealand will be closed off in a bid to protect “vulnerable ” communities from the spread of coronavirus.

Ardern said all aged care facilities would be closed to everyone but staff and essential deliveries from noon local time Wednesday.

“I realize how incredibly difficult this will be for those who have loved ones living in these facilities but it is the strongest way that we can protect and look after them,” Ardern said.

Mass testing: Speaking at the same news conference, Bloomfield said health officials have prepared “to test tens of thousands of people in the coming days, so we can see if there are anymore cases of Covid-19 in the community.”

He added that New Zealand has over 270,000 coronavirus tests in stock, with the ability to process 12,000 tests per day.

Back into lockdown: Auckland, the most populous city in New Zealand, was placed under level 3 restrictions following the confirmation of the new cases Tuesday. All non-essential businesses, including restaurants and bars, are closed, and residents are only allowed to leave home for essential activities such as grocery shopping. Schools in Auckland will also be closed for three days.

The rest of New Zealand went into level 2 restrictions, where businesses can remain open as long as they follow public health guidelines.

1 hr 2 min ago

"I've taken it myself": Russian CEO says he has administered Covid-19 vaccine to his family

From CNN's Leinz Vales

Kirill Dmitriev, head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) with CNN's Anderson Cooper and Dr. Sanjay Gupta. CNN

Kirill Dmitriev, head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF), which is funding the coronavirus vaccine research approved in Russia said Tuesday the rollout of the drug "will be very gradual."

"We're not going to give it to 10 million people tomorrow," Dmitriev told CNN's Anderson Cooper and Dr. Sanjay Gupta. "It's going to be a very gradual, careful rollout going forward."

Developed by the Moscow-based Gamaleya Institute, the vaccine has been named Sputnik-V, a reference to the surprise 1957 launch of the world's first satellite by the Soviet Union. It has yet to go through crucial Phase 3 trials where it would be administered to thousands of people.

"We can say that it works," Dmitirev told Gupta. "I've taken it myself. I've given it to my parents, to my wife."

The announcement of the Russian coronavirus vaccine has been met with worldwide skepticism.

The World Health Organization said in a statement about the Russian vaccine that "accelerating vaccine research should be done following established processes through every step of development to ensure that any vaccines that eventually go into production are both safe and effective."

Cooper asked Dmitriev, "To those who are saying that this vaccine was rushed. You said it was proven. How has it been proven effective?"

"It's been proven through phase one, phase two trial," Dmitriev said. "We will have phase three trials in many other countries, in the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Brazil and Philippines."
"According to Russian law, when you have a pandemic, when you have epidemia like this, you can do phase three concurrently with launching to high-risk groups, which we are doing. We believe that's exactly the right approach, and this approach makes sense. And the rest of the world knowing some of the science behind our vaccine really likes what they see. We received 1 billion doses preorder already for the vaccine. I think time will tell the success of the Russian approach.

Russia has released no scientific data on its testing and CNN is unable to verify the vaccine's claimed safety or effectiveness.

1 hr 2 min ago

Fauci says he seriously doubts Russia has proven new vaccine is safe and effective

From CNN's Lauren Mascarenhas

Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases, testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, on July 31. Kevin Dietsch/Pool/AFP via Getty Images

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the US' top infectious disease expert, said he seriously doubts Russia has proven its coronavirus vaccine is safe and effective after Moscow said it had approved a drug for use Tuesday.

“I hope that the Russians have actually, definitively proven that the vaccine is safe and effective. I seriously doubt that they've done that,” Fauci told Deborah Roberts of ABC News for a National Geographic event to broadcast Thursday. A portion of the interview was posted by National Geographic on Tuesday.

Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said that having a vaccine and proving that a vaccine is safe and effective are two different things.

“We have half a dozen or more vaccines,” Fauci said. “So if we wanted to take the chance of hurting a lot of people or giving them something that doesn't work, we could start doing this, you know, next week if we wanted to. But that's not the way it works.”

Fauci said that if and when Americans hear announcements from countries like Russia or China about vaccine development, they have to remember that the United States has certain safety and efficacy standards in place. Makers of the Russian vaccine have not yet released any data from human trials.

The US Food and Drug Administration has said that it will only approve a vaccine if it meets a 50% efficacy requirement.

In a statement emailed Tuesday, the World Health Organization said it is in touch with Russian scientists and authorities and looks forward to reviewing details of the trials. According to WHO, there are 28 vaccines in human trials around the world.

1 hr 4 min ago

Trump tries to make the case the US is doing better than Europe

From CNN's Nikki Carvajal

US President Donald Trump speaks at a news conference in the James Brady Press Briefing Room at the White House, on Tuesday, August 11 in Washington. Andrew Harnik/AP

US President Donald Trump cited misleading statistics about coronavirus cases in Europe during a news briefing Tuesday, claiming inaccurately that the United States is currently handling the pandemic better than other countries.

“Since the end of July, the seven-day average for cases in the United States has fallen by nearly 20%, but the virus continues to increase in nations across the globe,” the President claimed, speaking before taking questions. “Last week, France and Germany both recorded their highest daily number of new cases in three months.”
“Not that I want to bring that up,” he added, “but might as well explain it to the media.”
“The seven-day case average for Germany has increased by 62% since last week, unfortunately, and that is truly unfortunate. It’s increased 82% in France, 113% in Spain, and 30% in the United Kingdom. Those are big increases. Cases are also rapidly increasing in the Netherlands, Sweden, Belgium, Switzerland, Slovakia, Estonia and other European counties. And in our country, they’re going down. We will be seeing that even more rapidly as time goes by, short time,” the President claimed.

It’s true that cases are rapidly rising in Europe, but the numbers are nowhere near the level of infection in the United States.

The US added 49,536 new cases on Monday, a day that consistently sees lower numbers. The US is averaging 54,409 new cases over the past seven days, which is up slightly from the previous few days.

However, the percentage change from the prior week in cases is down 10%, not 20% as the President claimed. This is also slightly lower than last week, when the US dipped down 16% compared to the prior week in this metric, according to a CNN analysis of data from Johns Hopkins University.

1 hr 9 min ago

US government strikes deal with Moderna for 100 million doses of its Covid-19 vaccine

From CNN's Jen Christensen

Moderna Inc. headquarters located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on Monday, May 25. Adam Glanzman/Bloomberg via Getty Images

The Trump administration has reached a $1.525 billion deal with Moderna Inc. to manufacture and deliver 100 million doses of the company’s Covid-19 vaccine once it is approved, according to a news release from the US Department of Health and Human Services.

President Donald Trump announced the deal during a media briefing on Tuesday.

Moderna is one of several companies manufacturing the vaccine “at risk,” as the industry calls it, meaning the company is currently making the vaccine before it is approved. Clinical trials are currently underway to test whether it’s safe and effective.

Under this contract, worth up to $1.525 billion for 100 million doses, the doses would be owned by the US government and distributed and used as part of its Covid-19 vaccine campaign. If the doses are used, they would be provided to Americans at no cost. The government can also acquire up to an additional 400 million doses of this vaccine.

The vaccine, called mRNA-1273, was developed by Moderna in collaboration with the US government. It had development help from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and the US Biomedical Advance Research and Development Authority (BARDA) supported late stage clinical trials and has helped scale up manufacturing. Moderna’s advanced stage clinical trial, which started July 27, is the first government-funded Phase 3 clinical trial for a Covid-19 vaccine in the US.

This contract is a part of the US government’s Operation Warp Speed, the federal push to get vaccines and therapeutics to market as soon as safely possible. HHS said the goal is to get effective vaccines to the American people by the end of the year.

The government also reached a deal with Pfizer in July to produce 100 million doses of its vaccine. In August it agreed a similar deal for 100 million doses with Janssen, the Johnson & Johnson vaccine arm, for its vaccine candidate. It has other deals with GlaxoSmithKline, Sanofi Pasteur, Novavax and AstraZeneca.

There are 28 Covid-19 vaccines in human trials, according to the World Health Organization.

“In creating a vaccine portfolio for Operation Warp Speed, the Trump Administration is increasing the likelihood that the United States will have at least one safe, effective vaccine by 2021,” HHS Secretary Alex Azar said in Tuesday’s news release. “Today’s investment represents the next step in supporting this vaccine candidate all the way from early development by Moderna and the National Institutes of Health, through clinical trials, and now large-scale manufacturing, with the potential to bring hundreds of millions of safe and effective doses to the American people.”

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