Friday, December 3, 2021

Oh my God.... READ every word and pass it on to everyone you know.)...EXCLUSIVE | Nurse Sounds Alarm On Heinous Medical Malpractice: Immediate Intubation, Remdesivir Killed Covid Patients

 

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2021/11/exclusive-nurse-blows-whistle-heinous-medical-malpractice-covid-patients-killed-remsdevir-immediate-intubation/

 

 Read EVERYTHING !!

 

 

EXCLUSIVE | Nurse Sounds Alarm On Heinous Medical Malpractice: Immediate Intubation, Remdesivir Killed Covid Patients

 

Disclaimer: The following is an in-depth interview with Nurse Helen Smith and is comprised of her personal experiences from the past year.

 

A nurse who has worked in the intensive care unit for over two decades is blowing the whistle on the disturbing malpractice she has witnessed and was subjected to in a hospital’s intensive care unit throughout the coronavirus pandemic.

As the medical community adjusts to treating the man-made virus, a Chi-com bioweapon, the end of the “state of emergency” appears to have no end.


The government-mandated experimental mRNA “vaccines,” a petri dish of lethal substances that a reported 80 percent of Americans have taken out of fear – fear of falling ill from the treatable virus, fear of losing their livelihood and careers, fear of being barred from society – has ushered in an unprecedented number of deaths.

The Covid shots are killing healthy young adults at an unprecedented rate and depleting natural immunity, Helen Smith, a veteran nurse who is traumatized from what she has observed and endured while working in the intensive care unit during the “pandemic,” warned in an exclusive interview with the Gateway Pundit.

“I have been a nurse for almost 25 years. Most of my career has been in ICU. I have never seen anything like this in my whole career,” Smith confessed. “They are not allowing doctors to do what they want to do to help the patients. Everything is being regulated by higher-ups in the hospitals.”

The veteran nurse described in detail a litany of unorthodox, unhygienic and dangerous practices that were implemented within medical facilities at the start of the bio war and worsened month after month.

Prior to the Covid vaccine administration, patients were not actually dying from the virus, but from medical malpractice, Smith explained.

“They were dying because doctors were immediately intubating patients and providing them with Remdesivir, an expensive drug that does nothing to treat Covid or respiratory illness, but shuts down the organs,” the nurse, who worked at Cleveland Clinic Indian River Hospital exclusively during Covid, recollected.

During the first wave of Covid, doctors abruptly abandoned protocol typically administered to patients suffering from severe respiratory illness and were instructed to comply with regulations that in retrospect amount to the administration of mass murder.

PATIENTS WERE DYING FROM LETHAL INTUBATION, NOT CORONAVIRUS

“At the beginning, they weren’t even allowing them oxygen; they were just intubating them right away. At the time, they said they didn’t want to spread the Covid so they wouldn’t do high flow, or BIPAP or any other therapeutics, they just automatically got intubated with a breathing tube, a ventilator,” Smith asserted.

Adhering to the American Medical Association, Center For Disease Control and Food and Drug Administration directives, doctors began withholding Hydroxychloroquine and Ivermectin, medications that were effectively treating Covid patients, and began exclusively administering Remdesivir, a drug that ineffectively treats the virus and has lethal side effects.


“A major part of why people were dying from Covid is because they were putting people on Remdesivir and intubating them. The only drug they were giving people is Remdesivir – and we still are. Remdesivir costs $5,000 a bag and it doesn’t do anything. It can shut your organs down. A lot of the covid patients treated with Remdesivir end up on dialysis,” she said. “Intubating patients is basically a death sentence, especially with the Delta variant, we save very few.

“At one point we had a doctor giving patients Ivermectin because he was having such success in his outpatient clinic and they came through. The management of the Cleveland Clinic, the higher-ups, threatened to fire him if he continued to do so. He’s not confrontational, he just kind of goes along to get along. I will say, in his defense, that he will give it to the nurses if we get it.”

Helping patients remain calm when they cannot breathe can mean life or death for those admitted to a hospital with Covid.

“We even plead with patients to stay calm – because they can’t breathe, and they freak out and they end up on the ventilator. We beg them, ‘You don’t want to go on the ventilator. We are not having good success.’ We even tell the patients that.

DELTA VARIANT:  THE TWILIGHT ZONE

Conspicuously, as thousands of Americans got their first and second doses of mRNA gene therapy, the first human trial of the drug that was previously only tested on animals, the “Delta variant” of the coronavirus virus spawned.

Suddenly, the intensive care unit faced an influx of patients who were severely ill from Delta, and, astonishingly, nearly all of them received at least one dose of a Covid vaccine.

Those on the frontline were left in shock and bereavement and rendered futile in saving one patient after another from dying from the mutated virus. Even the young and healthy began passing away while being withheld life-saving medications.

“This is what’s weird. After the vaccines came out so did the Delta variant,” Smith said. “I have never in my career have seen anything like it. We were losing five to six patients a day.”

Amid the prohibition of effective treatments, there was barely enough space in the hospital to accommodate the influx of critically ill patients.

“It was so bad, so crowded, that we were taking single rows in the ICU and doubling them with patients. In the ICU, I  ‘heavy’ patients – sick, sick patients. It was almost like a MASH unit,” she continued. “Like being in a medic warzone because so many were dying. There were days we lost 5 patients, just in a 12-hour work shift. Everybody is walking around going, ‘Are we in the twilight zone?’

“When the vaccines were first administered, you would not believe the number of strokes we got. The Cleveland Clinic is a stroke center and I had never seen anything like it. I had two patients with drains in their brain to relieve the pressure, which is rare, you don’t see that often. A lot of strokes – one who got MS – we had a bunch of different critically ill patients, and if you look at their medical records, they don’t attribute their death to the vaccine they just got – they don’t say it’s from the vaccine.”

Mysteriously, as the number of patients suffering from Delta infection increased, the number of Covid-positive patients diminished.

“All of a sudden, after the delta variant and they all died off, we have no covid patients right now. There are no covid patients in the ICU,”  the nurse made clear. “As of the last 3 weeks, there are no Covid patients – that’s why they are firing everybody now. We are getting really sick medical type patients – heart, lung. I read that a lot of hospitals are getting a spike of this kind of patient– with these severe, sudden medical issues. We are getting that as well.

GENE THERAPY OR EUGENICS?

“The vaccine doesn’t do anything to help you. It doesn’t. We think it caused the Delta variant. The nurses, among ourselves, we all talk. It got worse after the vaccine. It was hardcore. It was bad. A lot of people died. And I’m talking – we were losing 20-year-olds. The first Covid wave took the lives of older people with a lot of illnesses. The delta wave was mostly obese people, I will say that, but we lost people in their 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s – you name it.

“A lot of young, really healthy people — they’re the ones that seem to be getting the heart issues. I have a nurse of child-bearing age that took it and she had to get surgery because she was vaginally bleeding so bad after the shot.

“My own sister took the vaccine and now she is anemic and having to go to the doctor and get iron and stuff all the time.”

As Smith presented research conducted by Dr. Robert Malone, the banned inventor of the mRNA technology who persistently warns against the use of his experiment, she was chided and mocked by her colleagues. Now, they’re beginning to heed the warning.

“After Dr. Malone, the inventor of the mRNA vaccines came out warning about the deadly side-effects of BioNtech gene therapy and spike proteins, I tried to get everyone I know to listen and they just looked at me like I was crazy. They just gave up on me,” she said. “Actually, I’ve had a couple of nurses apologize to me because I was one of the first ones to find out about the fetal cells. They all apologized because they didn’t believe me at first.”

Amid the number of vaccine-related fatalities spiking to an alarming all-time high in 2021, medications that would allow people to quickly recover from Covid and Delta remains essentially outlawed in the medical community.

At least now, after months of carelessly following marching orders, doctors are refraining from recklessly putting patients on the ventilators.

Warning: COVID Vaccine ‘Spike Protein Shedding’ Damages Placenta, ‘We Are Being Experimented On’

“What they are trying to do now is put them on what we call high flow oxygen or we are putting them on a mask called BiPap,” Smith said. “If they then continue to defect, then we intubate them. So, we are at least giving them a chance before we intubate them now. When we were still using Hydroxychloroquine on our patients, we only lost two people a day from Covid. During the Delta wave, we had twice as many patients sick from the variant and we only saved 5 a day. And we couldn’t use Hydroxychloroquine. Dealing with the delta variant was the worst thing I’ve ever seen.”

DEPOPULATIONGATE?

Defectors of the mainstream narrative have long been relentlessly subject to smear campaigns for shining light on the truth, but the fake news industry has doubled down on its attempt to manipulate the public amid the global “plandemic.”

The culture war waged by the radical left to demonize Republicans as white supremacists and glorify Democrats in the United States pales in comparison to the diabolical global psychological war intended to malign, deem “crazy” and cancel any and everyone who expose lies surrounding Covid propaganda and programming.

You’re not just a “conspiracy theorist” if you believe the pandemic is a man-made crisis or that Covid is a bioweapon that effectively destroyed the U.S. electoral system in 2020 with a flood of illegitimate mail-in ballots or that Ivermectin— a Nobel-prize winning medication— is not just a “horse dewormer.”

Now, according to Joe Biden’s Department of Homeland Security, you’re a national security threat and a “domestic terrorist.”

As the powers that be desperately collude to obscure the climbing death rate ushered in by mandated vaccines and assault on medical autonomy, the Cleveland Clinic’s frontline nurse fears the perpetual crisis, life-threatening malfeasance and government tyranny will never come to end.

“They are going to keep mandating the shots. The vaccine is weakening the immune system so much, they are going to be forced to get the shots to have an immune system,” Smith said. “It’s hard to tell how much one dose of an mRNA vaccine weakens immunity. They haven’t been around long —  these have all been rushed through. It’s not like taking a smallpox shot. That had 10 to 20 years of testing. This is a new technology and it’s just being pushed out on us.”

Texas Doctor Resigns After Hospital Suspends, Investigates Her For Warning About Covid Shots, Promoting Ivermectin

SCIENCE VS. MEDICAL-INDUSTRIAL CABAL

It’s not that the doctors are lying to us, it’s that the FDA is lying to the doctors and they believe it, Smith contends.

“We’ve been bullied. We all know this virus came out of Wuhan. Even the doctors acknowledge that now. At first, they were all going along with it. The CDC and even the American Medical Association — these are people we really respected in my community — have lost all credibility. They’ve all gone rogue,'” she argued. “The CDC and the FDA need to stop regulating everything and let the doctors do their job.

“The doctors complied and said they were administering Remdesivir because ‘That’s the Cleveland Clinic way.’ They told us it has no bad side effects. There was a point when the vaccine first came out that the doctors were bullying us, by telling us they lost all respect for us and belittled us saying, ‘I thought you were smarter than that.’   All but 2 doctors at the hospital I work in have been vaccinated. Now, they are all admitting it’s not working. Now they are saying it isn’t as effective as they believed it was going to be.”

 REQUIRED: REUSE SAME N95 … FOR WEEKS

We turn to doctors and medical experts with the expectation of receiving sound medical advice, diagnosis, and treatment that is premised on science.

But during the never-ending fascistic Covid-19 pandemic, acceptance of illogic is a mandate and even doctors are being forced to comply with the inversion of facts.

Blue surgical masks and fabric-laden masks do not block the transmission of aerosols, including viruses. Yet, mask mandates became the law of the land under the Emergency Authorization Act.

N95 masks effectively block the passage of aerosols but must be disposed of after one use. The procedural guidance on N95’s went out the window for the first time in modern history during the first chapter of Covid.

As the coronavirus began to permeate throughout the United States, pandemic, hospital employees were required to wear the same N95 mask for weeks at a time and risked losing their jobs for failing to comply with the unsanitary dereliction of traditional medical protocol, Smith explained.

“In the beginning, there were hardly any doctors going in the Covid room. It was the nurses going in. Even housekeeping was scared to go in – and those rooms were filthy. They wouldn’t let us wear any mask in there,” she said. “Then they began making us reuse an N95.”

“Formerly, throughout my whole career, we used it once – just to go in a room—and then throw it away and then we’d put a new one. They were making us reuse the same mask at first for 2 or 3 weeks. They were disgusting. We were all getting sores and stuff on our face.”

Wearing masks that obstruct breathing and amass bacteria is obviously detrimental, but the application of Covid-era “science” requires N95 masks be used over and over and over again, and then get “sterilized” in a chemical to “safely” be worn over and over again.

“After we used the same mask for weeks, they started cooking them with some chemical to ‘sterilize’ and reuse it. People were having terrible reactions to that. Then, we had to reuse the gowns,” Smith said. “The masks don’t work and they are never going to come off, I’m guessing”

Dr. Fauci: Americans May Need Booster Shots Every 6 Months (VIDEO)

WHEN NO ONE IS LEGALLY EXEMPT 

Unable to provide patients with medication that almost immediately alleviates Covid symptoms, millions of doctors and nurses are backed into a corner. Those tasked with saving lives are forced to either ignore their conscience and comply with regulations that when “properly” implemented amount to mass murder or opt-out of legally practicing medicine.

Now, Smith and more than half of and the nurses at her hospital will soon be unemployed for refusing the Covid shot.

“They are trying to fire everyone at Cleveland Clinic. They won’t let anyone test out. I’d say a good  50 percent of nurses and doctors nationwide refuse to take the vaccine. I am working with a lot of nurses who are of childbearing age. They are scared to take it because they don’t know what it’s going to do with their reproductive health. There are some people that I work with at that hospital that were born in that hospital and they are working there and they are going to fire them,” Smith bemoaned. “We are just all refusing. We are not doing it.

Scientists “Mystified” Over Africa’s Low Vax Rate and Low COVID Numbers

“I am fixing to give up a 25-year career because I am being forced to take an injection I don’t want. I requested a religious exemption, and they refuse to give me one.”I am against this. It’s got fetal tissue in it and I want nothing to do with it. I recommend no one take this shot, I am from 25 years of medical. I am not going to take this experimental shot just because some old man out there is trying to make us. I am just not going to do it. I am not going to let the government way overreach. We are being taken over by fascists. We need to strike and shut the system down. They don’t realize that the people that are forcing this on us are keeping the system going. My last day of work is Thanksgiving weekend, the 29th.”

Cleveland Clinic’s vaccine exemption form.

 

Following the coerced mass exodus of millions of medical practitioners from the workforce, the shortage of doctors, nurses and behavioral health providers presents another crisis, particularly in underserved communities. Patients in overcrowded hospitals will be unattended to for longer periods of time and left to be treated by the remaining doctors who persist to comply with Dr. Fauci’s orders.

On Monday, the Biden administration announced its plan to invest $1.5 billion from the coronavirus relief law to address health workforce shortages.

That’s right. After forcing uncompliant doctors, nurses and first responders to resign, the administration that presides over historic hyperinflation will invest over a billion hard-earned taxpayer dollars to amend the crisis installed lawmakers are creating.

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Italy Holds “March of the Vaccine Dead” to Commemorate those Who Died from The COVID-19 Vaccines Italy Holds “March of the Vaccine Dead” to Commemorate those Who Died from The COVID-19 Vaccines

 

 https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2021/12/italy-holds-march-vaccine-dead-commemorate-died-covid-19-vaccines/

Italy Holds “March of the Vaccine Dead” to Commemorate those Who Died from The COVID-19 Vaccines (VIDEO)

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Screenshot: TheCOVIDWorld.com

Hundreds of people in Parma, Italy attended the “March of the Vaccine Dead”  last week to remember those people who died from the experimental COVID-19 vaccines.

Protesters were marching on the street with photos of their loved ones who were killed by the COVID-19 vaccines. It looks like hundreds were killed after vaccination, which is mandatory for working Italians.

 

The Covid World reported:

Last weekend, a group numbering in the hundreds staged a mourning march in Parma, Italy to commemorate those who have died as a result of the COVID-19 vaccine. The marchers held up pictures of the dead as they moved in solemn procession through central Parma, chanting the names of those lost to the experimental vaccines.

This kind of vigil seems to be spreading across the world. On November 20th, relatives of the vaccine dead held a vigil in South Korea where they shaved their heads in mourning for their lost loved ones and begged for answers from government officials.

Read more here.

The Gateway Pundit previously reported that the official European Union database of suspected drug reaction website is now reporting 30,551 fatalities and 1,163,356 adverse drug reactions from COVID vaccines Pfizer, Moderna, Johnson & Johnson, and AztraZeneca through November 13, 2021 based on the data submitted to its system.

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Thursday, December 2, 2021

NOW 2 people with the NEW Omicron (covid).... BOTH FULLY VACCINATED.

 

ONE in the state of California

ONE in the state of Minnesota

 

FULLY Vaccinated

 (and one had booster too)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wednesday, December 1, 2021

(Whites should do the same. shop at white stores etc, and Brown and Asian etc) Black Lives Matter calls for month-long boycott of ‘white companies’ 'White-supremacist-capitalism uses policing to protect profits and steal Black life,' BLM says

 Be proud of who you are... don't let any loser make you feel bad about something you had NOTHING TO DO WITH. Whites shop a white stores.... brown shop at brown.....etc.

 


Black Lives Matter calls for month-long boycott of ‘white companies’

 

'White-supremacist-capitalism uses policing to protect profits and steal Black life,' BLM says

The Black Lives Matter movement’s national arm is leading a boycott of "white companies" until New Year’s Day, encouraging supporters to help "end white-supremacist-capitalism" by visiting only Black-owned businesses during the holiday shopping season.

"White-supremacist-capitalism uses policing to protect profits and steal Black life," reads an Instagram post by the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation. "Skip the Black Friday sales and buy exclusively from Black-owned businesses."

"We’re dreaming of a #Blackxmas. That means no spending with white companies from 11/26/2021 – 01/01/2022," the BlackXmas website says. 


The organization also calls on supporters to "move your money out of white-corporate banks that finance our oppression and open accounts with Black-owned banks."

The boycott, promoted under the hashtag #BlackXmas and #BuyBlack, among others, started on Black Friday and ends on New Year’s Day.

Black Lives Matter protesters

Black Lives Matter protesters march past the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in Portland, Oregon, on July 31, 2020. (AP Photo/Noah Berger / AP Images)

"As BLMLA organizer, Jan Williams, reminds us, ‘Capitalism doesn’t love Black people,’" reads a blog post last week announcing the event. "In fact, white-supremacist-capitalism invented policing, initially as chattel-slavery-era ‘paddy rollers,’ in order to protect its interests and put targets on the backs of Black people."

"#BlackXmas challenges us to shake off the chains of consumerism and step fully into our own collective power, to build new traditions, and run an offense as well as a defense," the post continues. "Let’s harness our economic power to disrupt white-supremacist-capitalism and build Black community."

Jacob Blake Kenosha

A person holds up a skateboard that says "BLM" as people gather in front of the police station in Kenosha, Wisconsin, on Aug. 24, 2020. (Scott Olson/Getty Images / Getty Images)

Black Lives Matter first launched the event in 2014 in response to the police-involved death John Crawford at a Walmart in Beavercreek, Ohio, the blog post states.

The website blackxmas.org provides maps showing people where they can find Black-owned stores, restaurants and banks in Los Angeles and Long Beach, California, and South Bend, Indiana.

A video featured on the BlackXmas website show the BLM Los Angeles chapter protesting inside Beverly Hills businesses on Rodeo Drive in 2017.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE ON FOX BUSINESS

Black Lives Matter Seattle-King County

A protester holds a sign during a march against racial inequality and police brutality that was organized by Black Lives Matter on June 12, 2020, in Seattle. (AP Photo/Ted S. Warren / AP Images)

"Take it to the streets and f--- the police! No justice no peace!" the Santa-hat-wearing protesters chanted in the video just before blocking the intersection of Rodeo and Santa Monica Boulevard. 

BLM did not respond to FOX Business' inquiry on whether similar protests are planned for this year.

 

Tuesday, November 30, 2021

Why the hell does ANYONE have to work. Quit your job and collect like everyone else

 

 

 

Get your hand out like all of Biden's idiots

 

That way you can get new wigs, weaves, extensions, highlights, nails, new clothes, drive a nice car, jewelry, and much BOOZE and food.

Let the "hard working idiots" pay for it LOL

 

Monday, November 29, 2021

(look who the racists are)...BLM Launches ‘Black X-Mas,’ Calls for People to Only Buy From Black Businesses to Fight ‘White Supremacy’

 https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2021/11/blm-launches-black-x-mas-calls-people-buy-black-businesses-fight-white-supremacy/

 

 

RACISTS JERKS !!!Look who the racists are.

... I ALWAYS believed that everyone was equal.... look what has happened. Now you PISSED ME OFF.

Black Christmas... Kwanzaa.... what the hell??? Another day to "get" huh?

 

 

 

BLM Launches ‘Black X-Mas,’ Calls for People to Only Buy From Black Businesses to Fight ‘White Supremacy’

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After attacking Thanksgiving, Black Lives Matter has now set their sights on Christmas for the seventh year in a row.

The organization tweeted from their official Twitter account that for seven years they have been attempting to show “connections between white-supremacist-capitalism & police violence.”

 

The tweet linked to a LA Sentinel article by BLM activist and professor of Pan-African Studies at Cal State Los Angeles, Melina Abdullah, titled “#BlackXmas: Visioning Beyond the Weight of the Moment.”

Abdullah spent a lengthy paragraph whining about the verdict in the Kyle Rittenhouse case and “witnessing support for Black Lives Matter wane among white folks.”

“These hits can make it seem as if the system of white-supremacist-capitalism has won and is undefeatable,” she moaned.

Eventually, at the end of the article, she got to her point — politicize Christmas.

“For the last seven years, Black Lives Matter has been challenging people to ‘dream of a Black Xmas,’ to intentionally use our resources to: #BuildBlack (invest in Black-led, Black-serving organizations), #BuyBlack (spend exclusively with Black-owned businesses from Black Friday through New Year), and #BankBlack (move our money from white corporate banks to Black-owned ones).”

“In 2020, #BlackXmas expanded to a nationwide campaign, with a website, blackxmas.org, that provides a listing of organizations to support and businesses to shop. #BlackXmas is about not simply struggling against the systems that enable Rittenhouse, McMichaels, Schwartzman, Walmart, racist policing, violence, and exploitation, but fighting on our terms. #BlackXmas challenges us to shake off the chains of consumerism and step fully into our own collective power, to build new traditions, and run an offense as well as a defense,” Abdullah continued. “#BlackXmas is about being self-determined and felling existing structures by building new, and more viable, beneficial ones…in the names of our mightiest and most righteous warrior Ancestors, in the names of those stolen by police violence, in honor of our community, and as a commitment to the generations to come.”

 

travel ban?? We have let millions in from these countries already

 

 

Ban will not help

Friday, November 26, 2021

Bryan Adams Tests Positive For Covid Again, Goes To Hospital In Italy

 

 

Bryan Adams Tests Positive For Covid Again, Goes To Hospital In Italy

Bryan Adams has tested positive for Covid-19, the Canadian rock star wrote on Instagram Thursday.

“Here I am, just arrived in Milano, and I’ve tested positive for the second time in a month for Covid. So it’s off to the hospital for me. Thanks for all your support,” he said next to pictures of him at the Milan Malpensa airport and in an ambulance. His condition is unknown.

More from Deadline

Adams also tested positive Oct. 30 when he had to pull out from his scheduled appearance at Tina Turner’s Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony where he was to perform a medley of songs including “It’s Only Love,” which is a duet between Adams and Turner from his 1984 album.

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A rep for Adams at the time said that the musician is fully vaccinated and showed no symptoms.

It is unclear whether the latest positive test is a result of so-called shedding of the coronavirus, which results in those affected continuing to test positive for a long time beyond the period when they are contagious.

Adams, who is also a photographer, is in Italy to promote Pirelli’s 2022 calendar, for which he shot fellow musicians Cher, Grimes, Jennifer Hudson, Normani, Rita Ora, Bohan Phoenix, Iggy Pop, St. Vincent, Kali Uchis, and Saweetie.

Adams was scheduled to appear at in-person press events Sunday and Monday. It is unclear whether he would be able to attend.

Best of Deadline

 

UK Raises Alarm Over New COVID Variant Which Could Beat Vaccines

 

 

 https://www.newsmax.com/us/covid-uk/2021/11/25/id/1046222/

 

 

UK Raises Alarm Over New COVID Variant Which Could Beat Vaccines

UK Raises Alarm Over New COVID Variant Which Could Beat Vaccines
(Dreamstime)

Thursday, 25 November 2021 06:44 PM

 

Britain on Thursday said it was concerned by a newly identified coronavirus variant spreading in South Africa that might make vaccines less effective and imperil progress made across the world in fighting the pandemic.

The UK Health Security Agency said that the variant - called B.1.1.529 - has a spike protein that was dramatically different to the one in the original coronavirus that COVID-19 vaccines are based on.

Officials characterize the variant, which has double the number of mutations as the currently dominant Delta variant, as the "worst one yet."

 

It was only first identified at the start of the week but Britain rushed to introduce travel restrictions on South Africa and five neighboring countries, acting much more swiftly than with previous variants.

"What we do know is there's a significant number of mutations, perhaps double the number of mutations that we have seen in the Delta variant," Health Secretary Sajid Javid told broadcasters.

"And that would suggest that it may well be more transmissible and the current vaccines that we have may well be less effective."

Britain announced it was temporarily banning flights from South Africa, Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Lesotho and Eswatini from 1200 GMT on Friday and returning British travelers from those destinations would have to quarantine.

Javid said that more data was needed but the travel restrictions were necessary as a precaution, as scientists said lab studies were needed to assess the likelihood of the mutations resulting in greatly reduced vaccine efficacy.

Officials have advised the government on the need to act swiftly and pre-emptively in case the concerns over the impact of variant are borne out, even though it could take weeks to generate all the information needed about its characteristics.

Earlier on Thursday, South African scientists said they had detected the new COVID-19 variant in small numbers and were working to understand its potential implications.

 

The variant has also been found in Botswana and Hong Kong, but the UK Health Security Agency said that no cases of the variant had been detected in Britain.

“Early evidence from genomic surveillance in South Africa suggests that B.1.1.529 is a serious cause for concern," Ewan Birney, Deputy Director General of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory, said.

"We know that early action is far better than late action. It may turn out that this variant is not as large a threat as Alpha and Delta, but the potential consequences of not acting on the possibility it could be are serious."

 
 

© 2021 Thomson/Reuters. All rights reserved.

 

Asian and European Countries, Alarmed by New COVID Variant, Tighten Curbs (possible vaccine resistant?)

 

 

Asian and European Countries, Alarmed by New COVID Variant, Tighten Curbs

Asian and European Countries, Alarmed by New COVID Variant, Tighten Curbs
(Dreamstime)

Friday, 26 November 2021 05:52 AM 

 
Global authorities reacted with alarm on Friday to a new coronavirus variant detected in South Africa, with the EU, Britain and India among those announcing stricter border controls as scientists sought to determine if the mutation was vaccine-resistant.

Britain banned flights from South Africa and neighboring countries and asked British travelers returning from there to quarantine, while European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said the EU also aimed to halt air travel from the region.

Scientists are still learning about the variant, identified this week, but the news pummeled global stocks and oil amid fears what new travel bans would do to already shaky economies across southern Africa.

The variant has a spike protein that is dramatically different to the one in the original coronavirus that COVID-19 vaccines are based on, the UK Health Security Agency said, raising fears about how current vaccines, successful against the more familiar delta variant, will fare.

"As scientists have described, (this is) the most significant variant they've encountered to date," British Transport Secretary Grant Shapps told Sky News.

The World Health Organization (WHO) is to hold a meeting in Geneva at 1100 GMT. Experts will discuss the risks it presents and if it should be designated as a variant of interest or variant of concern, WHO spokesperson Christian Lindmeier said.

Nearly 100 sequences of the variant have been reported, and early analysis shows it has "a large number of mutations" requiring further study, Lindmeier said.

One epidemiologist said it may be too late to tighten travel curbs.

"I think we have to recognize that most likely this virus is already in other places. And so if we shut the door now, it’s going to be probably too late," said Ben Cowling of the University of Hong Kong.

South Africa will speak to British authorities to try to get them to reconsider their ban, the foreign ministry in Pretoria said. "Our immediate concern is the damage that this decision will cause to both the tourism industries and businesses of both countries," Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor said in a statement.

'ACT STRONG, FAST AND NOW'

The variant, called B.1.1.529, has also been found in Botswana and Hong Kong, according to the UK Health Security Agency. Israel said it was barring its citizens from traveling to southern Africa after one case of the new strain was found in a traveler returning from Malawi.

"We are currently on the verge of a state of emergency, " Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said, according to a statement from his office.

"Our main principle is to act fast, strong and now."

European countries had already been expanding booster vaccinations and tightening curbs as the continent battles a fourth wave of the coronavirus, led by the delta variant, with many reporting record daily rises in cases.

The new wave and discovery of the new variant come as Europe and the United States enter winter, with more people gathering indoors in the run-up to Christmas, providing a breeding ground for infection.

Italy imposed an entry ban on people who have visited southern African states in the last 14 days, and Germany will declare South Africa a virus variant area, a health ministry source said.

India issued an advisory to all states to test and screen international travelers from South Africa and other "at risk" countries after easing some of its travel restrictions earlier this month.

Singapore's health ministry said it would also restrict arrivals from the region, and Japan tightened border controls for visitors from South Africa and five other African countries.

The coronavirus has swept the world in the two years since it was first identified in central China, infecting almost 260 million people and killing 5.4 million.

© 2021 Thomson/Reuters. All rights reserved.

 

(here we go again) WHO meets to discuss new, ‘heavily mutated’ COVID-19 variant...Variant seems to be most heavily mutated so far in outbreak

 

 

 https://www.foxnews.com/health/who-meets-to-discuss-new-heavily-mutated-covid-19-variant

 

 

 (anther post says possible vaccine resistant)



WHO meets to discuss new, ‘heavily mutated’ COVID-19 variant

Variant seems to be most heavily mutated so far in outbreak

Joe Phaahla, South Africa’s minister of health, identified the new variant as B.1.1.529, and said it seems highly contagious among young people.

The BBC reported that the new variant seems to be the most heavily mutated so far in the outbreak. James Gallagher, the health correspondent, wrote that one scientist described the variant as "horrific." He said the meeting of the WHO will likely result in the variant receiving a Greek code-name, like the delta variant.

"This variant did surprise us," Tulio de Oliveira, the director of the Center for South Africa’s Epidemic Response and Innovation, told the news outlet. "It has a big jump on evolution [and] many more mutations that we expected."Health Minister Joe Phaahla  on a site visit  at the Grand West Casino on August 20, 2021 in Cape Town, South Africa. 
 
Nature magazine reported that the variant was first reported in Botswana earlier this month. The report said scientists are trying to determine if the variant can somehow evade the immune response. One researcher in Johannesburg said, "We’re flying at warp speed.
 
 An overview of Discovery Health Covid-19 vaccination site on October 21, 2021 in Sandton, South Africa. 


Aris Katzourakis, an expert at virus evolution at the University of Oxford, said, "A burning question is does it reduce vaccine effectiveness because it has so many changes."


The British government announced that it was banning flights from South Africa and five other southern African countries effective at noon (1200GMT) on Friday, and that anyone who had recently arrived from those countries would be asked to take a coronavirus test.


U.K. Health Secretary Sajid Javid said there were concerns the new variant "may be more transmissible" than the dominant delta strain, and "the vaccines that we currently have may be less effective" against it.

Grant Shapps, the British transportation secretary, called the move essential, according to Reuters. He said the spike protein was "dramatically different" from the virus that the vaccines were designed to counter.

The Israeli Health Ministry says it has detected the country's first case of a new coronavirus variant in a traveler who returned from Malawi. Naftali Bennett, the prime minister, said the country is close to declaring a state of emergency over the variant.

The Associated Press contributed to this report