The health crisis in China has worsened to an alarming degree. The government of Zhejiang Province (eastern China) announced today (Sunday) that its hospitals receive about one million new infections per day.
The governorate authorities expected that the number of infected people would double in the coming days. And the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention announced yesterday that the country had not witnessed any deaths during the previous five days.
It is no longer possible to accurately verify the number of new cases in China; As the National Health Authority has stopped announcing the number of new asymptomatic infections. And the authority announced that it had decided, as of today, to stop the number of new infections.
And the Zhejiang Provincial government stated, in a statement on Sunday, that it expects the current virus wave to reach its peak by the first day of the New Year. She added that she expected the number of new cases by that day to reach about two million per day. And the World Health Organization announced in Geneva that it had not received any reports from China regarding the number of hospitalized patients with Covid-19.
Analysts said, according to Reuters today, that with the expectation that the Chinese will be willing to travel during the Chinese Lunar New Year holiday, the regions that were not affected by the current virus wave will suffer from it very soon. And the Associated Press spoke yesterday about “intensive care units that are full of patients, and undertaker shops that crowded with relatives of the deceased, awaiting cremation rituals.” She noted that the emergency departments in small cities and towns to the south of the capital, Beijing, were groaning under the weight of the crowds of patients. Because of the lack of beds, patients were seen scattering in the corridors of hospitals, which were crowded with relatives of patients looking for beds to sleep their loved ones.
Experts estimated that China will face, by the end of 2023, a number of deaths ranging between one and two million deaths. Despite the exacerbation of the health crisis; However, the decision of the government of Chinese President Xi Jinping on December 7 to abandon the “zero Covid” strategy resulted in the death of a number of industries that specialized in providing requirements for controlling virus infection, especially companies that manufacture protective clothing from Covid, companies that manufacture examination swabs, and specialized companies. In the management of health isolation centers, and those that specialize in tracking contacts of infected people, with the applications they produce and electronic devices to monitor the movements of individuals.
Preliminary estimates indicated that China spent no less than $52 billion on these industries in 2022. Other estimates put the Chinese government's collective compulsory checks at between 1.5% and 1.8% of China's GDP. And within days of the decision to drop “Zero Covid”; About 30 provincial governments have canceled contracts for services and products from companies specialized in combating the epidemic.
in London; And two days before the retirement of the most prominent face of the new Corona virus epidemic; The director of the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Dr. Anthony Fauci, told the British newspaper The Guardian that he faced a difficult situation following the emergence of the virus at the end of 2019, during the administration of former President Donald Trump. He explained that he was forced to intervene every time Trump made statements that were not backed by science to correct the situation, especially when the former president claimed that the well-known malaria drug, hydroxychloroquine, treats the virus.
Fauci said: I was not happy to contradict what the president says. But I had to. He added: There are positive things that should not be underestimated. Including the "lightning speed" operation to distribute Corona vaccines, which has achieved resounding success. The credit for this must go to the Trump administration.
Okaz monitors new medicines and vaccines
• The US Food and Drug Administration announced that it had decided to cancel the freeze it imposed on recruiting volunteers to try a genetic drug developed by the US Bluebird Pharmaceutical Company to treat sickle cell anemia in children and adolescents. The newer sickle cell disease drug is called Zentiglu. Experts said Zintiglo is very effective in relieving pain caused by sickle cell anemia.
• Eli Lilly, the giant pharmaceutical company, announced that it will launch five new drugs on the market during the year 2023, which will guarantee it abundant profits throughout the next decade. The most important of these drugs is related to the treatment of obesity and Alzheimer's disease. Eli Lilly's drug, terzipatide, was approved by the Food and Drug Administration in 2022 to treat obese people with type 2 diabetes. It will be sold under the brand name Monjaro. The company expected to spend on advertising and marketing during 2023 between $6.9 billion and $7.1 billion. Among the drugs that the company will launch in 2023 is a drug for early dementia, and another for the treatment of cancer. And she said that she expects that her profits during 2023 will reach between 30.3 billion and 30.8 billion dollars.
• Last week, the US Food and Drug Administration approved a drug developed by Acer Therapeutics to treat urea cycle disorders, a genetic disease that causes a build-up of toxic ammonia in the blood, as a result of a defect in certain enzymes. In its approval letter, the FDA stated that this drug could be used in conjunction with healthcare medications commonly given to people with urea cycle disorders.
• A study conducted by scientists at the British University of Oxford showed that the drug molnopiravir, which was produced by the American pharmaceutical company Merck for the treatment of Covid-19, accelerates the recovery of the patient, but does not reduce the chances of his sleep, or his death in adults who were vaccinated with Covid-19 vaccines, but they suffer from chronic diseases. . This drug generated about five billion dollars in sales for Merck during the first three quarters of 2022. The supervisor of the British researchers, Professor Jonathan Fantham, said that immunizing a person with Covid-19 vaccines is strong enough, prevents hypnosis and reduces the odds of death from the virus. Without the need for Merck's medication.
• Last week, the US Food and Drug Administration approved a monoclonal antibody drug developed by the Swiss company Roche Holding to treat COVID-19 in hospitalized adults. The drug is called Acterma. It is an anti-inflammatory that Roche has been marketing for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis. Last November, the authority withdrew the license of a similar antibody drug produced by Eli Lilly, claiming that it had failed to treat the BQ.1 and BQ.1.1 strains that dominate the health crisis in the United States.
• The Japanese company, Sysmix, announced (Thursday) that it had obtained the approval of the Japanese Food and Drug Authority for a blood test it devised to detect the presence of amyloid-beta protein in the brain, which means that a person has Alzheimer's disease. The company said that it developed this examination in cooperation with the Japanese pharmaceutical company Eisai. The new test uses a very small amount of blood to detect the presence of the aforementioned protein, which means that the disease can be diagnosed before it spreads in the person's brain. The Japanese Ministry of Health says that Japan, which is known for having a large number of elderly people, has about 6 million people with dementia, of which Alzheimer's is a complication. And if this examination becomes available in the market, it is a quick and inexpensive way to examine Alzheimer’s, whose diagnosis currently requires an advanced imaging technique called positron emission tomography, through magnetic resonance images, and through painful spinal biopsies.
• The Swiss pharmaceutical company, Roche Holding, announced that it had received approval from the US Food and Drug Administration for the drug Lonsumio, which was developed by its scientists to treat a rare type of lymphoma called follicular lymphoma. The company said that the data of its clinical trials confirmed the ability of this drug to remove this cancer from the body if the patient continued to use it over a period of 18 months. It is expected that the cost of the amount of medication for eight treatment cycles will reach $180,000.
Okaz Health Observatory (numbers in millions)
• World injuries: 661.71
• World mortality: 6.68
• America: 102.21
• France: 39.16
• Germany: 37.21
• Brazil: 36.16
• South Korea: 28.66
• Japan: 28.27
• Russia: 21.76
(“Okaz”/ WorldOmeter/ Johns Hopkins/ The New York Times – 12/25/2022)
Okaz (Beijing, London, Washington) @OKAZ_online