China’s CanSino Biologics Inc. said the efficacy rate for the company’s single-dose Covid-19 vaccine may fall over time although it should still have a rate of 50 percent or more five to six months after inoculation.
Data was withheld from World Health Organization investigators who travelled to China to research the origins of the coronavirus epidemic, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on March 30.
Leaders of 23 countries and the World Health Organization on March 30 backed an idea to create an international treaty that would help deal with future health emergencies like the coronavirus pandemic by tightening rules on sharing information.
A joint WHO-China study on the origins of Covid-19 says the virus was probably transmitted from bats to humans through another animal, and that a lab leak was “extremely unlikely” as a cause, the Associated Press reported on March 29.
Despite a high-profile visit to China by a team of international experts in January, the world is no closer to knowing the origins of Covid-19, according to one of the authors of an open letter calling for a new investigation into the pandemic.
Nearly two thirds of Russians are not willing to receive Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine, and about the same number believe the new coronavirus was created artificially as a biological weapon, an independent pollster said on March 1.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued new guidance for vaccine makers as the regulatory agency is preparing for the possibility of needing to approve Covid-19 booster shots against variants of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
Novavax announced a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, to provide 1.1 billion doses of the company’s Covid-19 vaccine candidate NVX-CoV2373 for the COVAX Facility.
The World Health Organization listed AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 vaccine for emergency use, widening access in the developing world, while sources said the EU is in talks with Moderna on buying more vaccines.
Chinese authorities refused to provide World Health Organization investigators with raw, personalized data on early Covid-19 cases that could help them determine how and when the coronavirus first began to spread in China, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing WHO investigators.
