With the European Union Medicines Agency (EMA) approval Thursday of Johnson and Johnson’s one-shot COVID-19 vaccine, it now remains to be seen which countries and regions will be the first in line for distribution of the one-jab vaccine. Along with its comparatively low-cost, and ease of storage, the one-shot vaccine could be particularly important to […] Continue reading ->
NAIROBI – Kenya is one of the leading African countries yet to ratify the African Medicines Agency Treaty (AMA) – but a senior official in the Ministry of Health has said that the move should come soon. According to Susan Mochache, the country’s Principal Secretary in the Ministries of Health (MoH), Kenya has already undergone […] Continue reading ->
“The future generations are not going to excuse this,” pleaded Kawaldip Sehmi, CEO of the International Alliance of Patients’ Organizations (IAPO). “They will be looking at us and will say, ‘What the hell were they doing procrastinating on their neighbors during a pandemic?” Sehmi was one of seven speakers from across Africa who convened at […] Continue reading ->
A study of people taking regular, low doses of aspirin found that the aspirin users were 29% less likely than others to test positive for COVID-19, as well as being less prone to serious disease and its “long COVID” after-effects. The new peer-reviewed study, published in The FEBS Journal of the Federation of European Biochemical […] Continue reading ->
African governments, the private sector, and development partners need to invest more in health and health systems to intensify the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic and any future disease outbreaks, according to health experts speaking at the African Health Agenda International Conference (AHAIC) on Tuesday. The experts agreed that a comprehensive, multi-sectoral approach is needed […] Continue reading ->
The Chinese-developed “CoronaVac” vaccine against COVID-19 vaccine triggers a sixfold reduction in neutralizing antibody response against the P.1 variant first identified in Brazil, according to a pre-print study published last week, while the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine is likely effective against the variant of concern. These findings come as hospitals in northern Brazil are increasingly overwhelmed and […] Continue reading ->
A senior official at the European Medicines Agency (EMA) has cautioned EU member states to wait until the agency has reviewed the safety and efficacy data of Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine before granting the vaccine emergency use authorization at national level, and beginning mass rollouts. Last week, the EMA formally began a rolling review of […] Continue reading ->
Less than half of Africa’s citizens (52%) – some 615 million people – have access to the healthcare they need, the continent’s quality of health services is generally poor and the family planning needs of half the continent’s women and girls are unmet. This is according to a report on Africa’s progress toward achieving universal […] Continue reading ->
The WHO-convened international investigation into the origin of the SARS-CoV2 virus is too politically limited by China and lacks the mandate to yield fully independent conclusions about how the novel coronavirus emerged and infected humans, according to a group of prominent international scientists – who have called for a new, independent and “unrestricted” probe into […] Continue reading ->
The World Health Organization (WHO) and its COVAX partners are hosting a summit next week with governments and pharmaceutical companies to address the bottlenecks in COVID-19 vaccine production and delivery. This follows a spectacular start in the past week for COVAX, the global vaccine delivery platform, which delivered more than 20 million doses of COVID-19 […] Continue reading ->