There is global concern and widespread alarm at the discovery of SARS-CoV-2 variant B.1.1.529, which the World Health Organisation (WHO) has called omicron.

The WHO classified omicron as a “variant of concern” because it has a wide range of mutations. This suggests vaccines and treatments could be less effective.

Although early days, omicron appears to be able to reinfect people more easily than other strains.

• READ MORE: WHO says not yet clear if omicron causes more severe disease

Australia has followed other countries and regions — including the United States, Canada, United Kingdom and the European Union — and banned travellers from nine southern African countries.

Australians seeking to return home from southern Africa will still be able to do so. But they will enter hotel quarantine and be tested.

Those who have returned from the nine countries – South Africa, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Lesotho, Eswatini, the Seychelles, Malawi and Mozambique – in the past 14 days will have to isolate.

But Omicron has already been detected in other regions, including the UK, Germany, Israel, Hong Kong and Belgium. So while a travel ban on southern African countries may slow the spread and buy limited time, it’s unlikely to stop it.

As the Australian government and others act to protect their own citizens, this should be accompanied by additional resources to support countries in southern Africa and elsewhere that take prompt action.

When was Omicron detected?
The variant was identified on November 22 in South Africa, from a sample collected from a patient on November 9.

South African virologists took prompt action, conferred with colleagues through the Network of Genomic Surveillance in South Africa, liaised with government, and notified the World Health Organisation on November 24.

This is in keeping with the International Health Regulations that guide how countries should respond.

The behaviour of this new variant is still unclear. Some have claimed the rate of growth of omicron infections, which reflects its transmissibility, may be even higher than those of the delta variant.

This “growth advantage” is yet to be proven but is concerning.

South African officials said the country is being “punished” for detecting the new Omicron variant as more countries rush to enact travel restrictions.

“Excellent science should be applauded and not punished,” the country said in a statement. https://t.co/Yicmn852uv

— Axios (@axios) November 27, 2021

‘Kneejerk’ response vs WHO recommendations
African scientists and politicians have been disappointed in what they see as a “kneejerk” response from countries imposing travel bans. They argue the bans will have significant negative effects for the South African economy, which traditionally welcomes global tourists over the summer year-end period.

They note it is still unclear whether the new variant originated in South Africa, even if it was first identified there. As omicron has already been detected in several other countries, it may already be circulating in regions not included in the travel bans.

Travel bans on countries detecting new variants, and the subsequent economic costs, may also act as a disincentive for countries to reveal variants of concern in future.

The WHO does not generally recommend flight bans or other forms of travel embargoes. Instead, it argues interventions of proven value should be prioritised: vaccination, hand hygiene, physical distancing, well-fitted masks, and good ventilation.

In response to variants of concern, the WHO calls on all countries to enhance surveillance and sequencing, report initial cases or clusters, and undertake investigations to improve understanding of the variant’s behaviour.

WHO warns world leaders against knee-jerk reaction to coronavirus variant from South Africa as U.K. and EU impose travel bans
WHO names new variant omicron, says it’s a variant of concern but there’s a lot we still don’t know.
Wear that face mask, peoplehttps://t.co/XdfnmKdf34

— ciara linnane (@LinnaneCiara) November 26, 2021

Omicron must be taken seriously. Its features are worrying, but there are large gaps in our current knowledge.

While further analyses are undertaken, the variant should be controlled with testing, tracing, isolation, applying known public health measures, and ongoing surveillance.

What can wealthier countries do to help?
Wealthy countries such as Australia should support African nations and others to share early alerts of potentially serious communicable disease threats, and help mitigate these threats.

As the Independent Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response noted in May:

[…] public health actors only see downsides from drawing attention to an outbreak that has the potential to spread.

The panel recommended creating incentives to reward early response action. This could include support to:

• establish research and educational partnerships
• strengthen health systems and communicable disease surveillance
• greatly improve vaccine availability, distribution, and equity
• consider financial compensation, through some form of solidarity fund against pandemic risk.

Boosting vaccine coverage is key
Vaccines remain the mainstay of protection against the most severe effects of covid-19.

It is unclear how effective vaccines will be against omicron, but some degree of protection is presumed likely. Pfizer has also indicated it could develop an effective vaccine against a new variant such as Omicron within 100 days or so.

Covid’s persistence is partly attributable to patchy immunisation coverage across many parts of the world, notably those least developed. South Africa itself is better off than most countries on the continent, yet only 24 percent of the adult population are currently fully vaccinated. For the whole of Africa, this drops to only 7.2 percent.

Greater global support is urgently needed to boost these vaccination rates.

African institutions and leaders, supported by global health and vaccine experts, have argued for mRNA vaccine manufacturing facilities on the African continent. These would prioritise regional populations, overcome supply-chain problems, and respond in real time to emerging disease threats.

Yet developing nations face significant barriers to obtaining intellectual property around covid-19 vaccine development and production.

While there is still much to learn about the behaviour and impact of omicron, the global community must demonstrate and commit real support to countries that do the right thing by promptly and transparently sharing information.

Dr Anthony Zwi is professor of global health and development, UNSW. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

New Zealand, Australia and other nations in the Pacific need to do more to combat rampant vaccine misinformation in Pacific Island countries, which poses a threat to the whole region, a researcher says.

The Sydney-based Lowy Institute think tank has released projections for when Pacific countries are likely to have vaccinated most of their populations against covid-19.

Lowy researcher Alexandre Dayant said while some Pacific countries have been world-leading in vaccine coverage, others are coming last, and parts of the region now face a humanitarian crisis.

•  LISTEN TO RNZ: Vaccine phobia stopping uptake in Papua New Guinea (duration 2′:47″)
• READ MORE: Forecasting vaccination in the Pacific

Smaller countries like the Cook Islands, Palau, Nauru and Niue have already achieved majority vaccination thresholds, but other countries lag far behind.

The forecasting shows that even by the start of 2023 there will likely still be a vast chunk of the population unvaccinated in Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu and the Solomon Islands.

Samoa is not expected to have vaccinated everyone 12 years and older until June next year, and Micronesia, the Marshall Islands and Kiribati are not expected to achieve full vaccination for those over 18 years old until part-way through 2022.

In Papua New Guinea, only 1.7 percent of the eligible population have been vaccinated so far, and the Lowy report said it could take until 2026 for just one third to be vaccinated.

Misinformation a barrier
Dayant said one of the main issues in PNG and elsewhere in the Pacific is misinformation.

He said that as well as continuing to support the health system in Pacific countries, New Zealand and the international community should help counter the rampant misinformation about vaccines.

“New Zealand and Australia could help in some ways – dealing with Facebook, seeing what can be done to better control the spread of misinformation on Facebook. I think this is an issue that Facebook has had to deal with for many years.

“Development partners must continue to partner with local government on their targeted counter-misinformation campaigns and develop a media messaging plan to ensure consistency of messaging about vaccines.”

The report said vaccine supply to Pacific nations was also still an issue, but lack of healthcare workers and difficulties getting to those who need to be vaccinated has created bigger logistical challenges, with many remote and diverse areas.

“How well vaccines are distributed and administered will have significant health, social and economic ramifications in the Pacific,” it said.

The New Zealand Council for International Development’s humanitarian network chair Quenelda Clegg told RNZ that in PNG vaccine hesitancy had become vaccine phobia.

“The situation is dire, people are genuinely afraid of this vaccine … and a critical reason why people are afraid of the vaccine is because of misinformation.

“Misinformation is being spread around the country, and it really is preventing people from going and getting help, and going to the health centres and getting that very crucial vaccine.”

Clegg said that before the arrival of covid-19 previous campaigns to reduce vaccine hesitancy had been successful in the Pacific, and she was hopeful the same could be done again.

“We’ve seen it done in Samoa, which went from a very low vaccine rate with the measles, and now today there’s around 100 percent vaccine take-up in the country — so that’s really positive.

“We also know from a recent study done by the World Bank that when people are receiving accurate messages, and are receiving up-to-date information about the safety of vaccines that actually the general intention to get vaccines goes up by around 50 percent.”

Access to the vaccine in geographically isolated areas, and cultural, economic and educational factors were all contributing to many people missing out in PNG, Clegg said.

New Zealand recently sent a health team to PNG, but if more was not done to help the country, Clegg said “we could see the death rate spiral, the country’s health systems collapse, and even the spread of covid-19 beyond PNG.”

The Council for International Development said New Zealand should donate its spare vaccines to PNG, help provide reliable cell phone coverage so health workers and community leaders there could pass on vaccine information, and fund mobile clinics to provide vaccinations in remote areas.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern says the New Zealand government wants to lift vaccination rates and wants to remove anything that is a barrier to getting as many people vaccinated as quickly as possible.

Ardern and Māori-Crown Relations Minister Kelvin Davis, who is also the MP for Te Tai Tokerau, are in Northland viewing the rollout of vaccinations.

Ardern spoke to media this afternoon until she was continuously interrupted by a conspiracy theorist in the crowd. She then decided to shut down and move the conference.

• READ MORE: Other NZ covid lockdown reports

In other developments today:

• Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins announced that the northern part of Northland would be tightened to level 3 from its current level 2 from 11.59pm tonight until Monday November 8 in response to two new cases that have no epidemiological or other link to cases in the region;
• The Ministry of Health announced 126 new community cases today —  107 in Auckland, 18 in the Waikato, and one in Northland. Of these, 59 cases were not epidemiologically linked;
• Tonga began its first lockdown due to covid, and the streets of Nuku’aliofa were reported to be quiet; and
• A traveller who arrived in New Zealand from Tuvalu tested positive for covid-19.

Low vax rates not government’s fault
In today’s media conference, Ardern said the low vaccination rates in Northland were not a failure of the government.

She said the government wanted to lift vaccination rates, and wanted to remove anything that was a barrier to getting as many people vaccinated as quickly as possible.

“I asked one provider, what are you hearing when you’re out vaccinating … they described it as covid not necessarily feeling close enough to the community yet, that even when there have been cases in Northland it might be seen as a valley over, not at the front door,” she said.

“We will do everything we can to keep it isolated, but we need everyone to be vaccinated.”

She said decisions were made based on public health advice.

Watch the media conference:

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Māori-Crown Relations Minister Kelvin Davis speak about vaccination in Northland. Video: RNZ News

In the conference, Ardern said the low vaccination rates in Northland are not a failure of the government.

She said the government wants to lift vaccination rates, and wants to remove anything that is a barrier to getting as many people vaccinated as quickly as possible.

“I asked one provider, what are you hearing when you’re out vaccinating … they described it as Covid not necessarily feeling close enough to the community yet, that even when there have been cases in Northland it might be seen as a valley over, not at the front door.”

“We will do everything we can to keep it isolated, but we need everyone to be vaccinated.”

She said decisions were made based on public health advice.

She would rather people were getting vaccinated regardless of alert level, because it was the right thing to do, she said.

Asked about the ruling ordering the ministry of health to reconsider its stance of withholding Māori vaccination data on the basis of privacy, Ardern said it was an issue about what data had been available or able to be shared, and she would allow the health team to work through that.

Raise concerns with professionals
She said people should be able to raise concerns about the vaccine, and if they had questions or concerns they should be able to come forward to talk to health professionals, or someone they trusted, to make the right decision.

She said the number of people who “would be described as … anti-vaccination” was relatively small in New Zealand. She said she absolutely believed the 90 percent double vaccinated rate the government was aiming for could be achieved.

She said young people in particular could be exposed to misinformation online, so there was more work ahead.

Ardern said despite best efforts, cases had come out of Auckland “and so we do need people to be vaccinated”.

Minister Davis said Te Tai Tokerau had not been forgotten.

“I have weekly meetings with all iwi leaders, so there’s a lot of work going into protecting our people, and as we’ve said there’s extra $4m going into the north today. We’re doing everything we can to make sure that our people are protected and people get vaccinated.”

Ardern said the approach from the government had been to ask Māori providers to focus on older kaumātua and kuia, and to take a whānau-based approach.

‘They think they’re smarter than the virus’
Davis was asked about protesters.

“That’s the first protest I’ve seen, there were two people. Obviously, they think they’re smarter than the virus… I don’t think it helps what we’re trying to do here, to protect whānau, to protect whakapapa.

“And to have people think that what’s going on is not reality? I think that they’re just living in a strange world.

“Our focus is on making sure that as many people as possible get vaccinated to protect their whānau, to protect their whakapapa, and that sort of stuff just doesn’t help at all.”

Ardern said misinformation existed everywhere but it was a minority voice.

Northland is one of the lowest-performing regions for vaccinations, with just 64 percent of the region fully vaccinated – second-last, only ahead of Tairāwhiti.

It is also the region that needs the largest number of first doses to reach 90 percent of the eligible population, with more than 17,000 doses required to reach that milestone.

The government’s proposed traffic light system would see restrictions across New Zealand reduced, and lockdowns ended, once every DHB in the country reaches 90 percent double dosed.

Northland also has a high percentage Māori population. Māori have accounted for about 40 to 50 percent of cases in the delta outbreak in recent weeks, and have lower vaccination rates than the rest of the population.

The government this morning announced the first round of funding for initiatives to boost Māori vaccination rates around the country, allocating $23.3 million from the $120m fund announced just over a week ago.

• The New Zealand Herald named the heckler who claimed to be a journalist as American Shane Chafin, a trained pharmacist in the US. Chafin claimed to be working for a little-known website purporting to be a “facts and evidence-based platform … covering the stories that many mainstream media outlets will not.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

When this novel coronavirus first swept the world last year, it was quickly obvious global vaccination was the only way out.

Governments invested billions in public funding and guaranteed pre-orders to corporations like Moderna, Pfizer/BioNtech, Johnson & Johnson, Novovax and Oxford/AstraZeneca to incentivise vaccine research and development.

Never before has a vaccine been created and tested so quickly. It was a tribute to human ingenuity and creativity, and a reminder of how powerful we are when we work together.

• READ MORE: COVID-19 vaccines have spawned nine new billionaires: campaign group

Yet, a year after the first person was vaccinated, less than 2 percent of people in the poorest countries have benefited.

Ahead of their annual shareholder meetings earlier this year, major vaccine producers, Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca revealed they had paid out US$26 billion in dividends and stock buybacks to shareholders in the previous 12 months.

Nine individuals have become billionaires off the back of coronavirus vaccines. Just how are these pharmaceutical corporations and their shareholders making their money?

Pharmaceutical corporations will not share their covid-19 vaccine intellectual property. This means they have a monopoly over a precious resource everyone needs. This gives them the power to charge excessive prices to maximise their profit. And this is what they have done.

Governments paying 4 to 24 times more than cost
Governments worldwide are paying between 4 and 24 times more than the estimated cost of producing the covid-19 vaccines. Experts, including Imperial College London, estimate the Pfizer and Moderna mRNA vaccines can be produced for as little as NZ$1.70.

According to reported prices that are available, even COVAX — the international facility set up to buy vaccines especially for poor countries — is paying an average of five times this cost.

Pfizer/BioNTech are charging their lowest reported price of NZ$9.70 to the African Union but this is still nearly six times more than the estimated production cost.

Israel has paid the highest reported price for Pfizer/BioNTech vaccines at NZ$40.26 a dose – nearly 24 times the potential production cost. Some reports suggest they paid even more.

In New Zealand, while the details are not public, we do know that in the 2021 Budget the Government set aside NZ$1 billion for vaccines. Assuming we have paid for all the vaccines that we have pre-purchase agreements for from this amount, (which is probably a generous assumption), we have paid at least nine times more than production costs.

As we consider the need for booster shots, Pfizer has suggested raising prices further.

I don’t buy the argument that pharmaceutical corporations have to charge so much because they invest in risky research and development. As stated, billions of public dollars went into the research and development of covid-19 vaccines.

Previous public investment
These vaccines would not be possible without decades of previous public investment in research and development.

Over the past 80 years, the US’s National Institutes of Health alone invested almost US$900 billion in biotech and pharmaceutical research, and continues to put in US$30 billion a year.

It is not pharmaceutical corporations investing in the risk of uncertainty, but governments across the world.

Besides that, pharmaceutical corporations spend more on marketing than on research and development. In 2013, Johnson & Johnson spent more than twice as much on sales and marketing than on R&D: US$17.5 billion versus US$8.2 billion.

For Pfizer, it was US$11.4 billion on marketing versus US$6.6 billion on R&D. Marketing costs are also tax deductible.

Further, economist Mariana Mazzucato reports pharmaceutical corporations put their profits into dividends and share buybacks that increase stock prices and CEO pay. That is precisely what we are seeing during this pandemic.

Put simply, the public fund the bulk of pharmaceutical research and development. Pharmaceutical corporations get the intellectual property and know-how, then force the public to pay again for vaccines, at prices far above a reasonable profit.

Money goes to already wealthy individuals
The ultimate result is public money going into the pockets of already wealthy individuals.

While they get rich, millions fall back into extreme poverty – living on less than NZ$2.70 a day – and the coronavirus continues to circulate and mutate, potentially rendering these vaccines obsolete and holding us all to ransom for years to come.

Soon negotiations will be under way again at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) to get consensus among governments to waive the intellectual property rights for covid-19 vaccines.

New Zealand supports this waiver, but the challenge is to persuade countries such as Germany and the UK. If this can be achieved, it will break the pharmaceutical corporations’ monopoly and allow vaccine supply to expand and the cost to drop.

The work doesn’t end there. How can we recreate our system to develop essential medicines and get them to everyone, using public funds for collective well-being, and avoid creating another handful of billionaires?

Dr Jo Spratt is the advocacy and communications director at Oxfam Aotearoa. This article is republished with the permission of the author and Oxfam.

The national strategy of vaccinating against covid-19 through general and mass events is not working for Māori, with even clinics that prioritise Māori and Pasifika being “swamped” by Pākehā, a covid-19 researcher says.

Earlier this week, opposition Act Party leader David Seymour tweeted out a vaccine code reserved for Māori, encouraging his supporters to use the code themselves.

The code was sent by Māori health provider Te Whānau o Waipareira via confidential email to its clients as part of a push to lift Māori vaccination rates that are less than two thirds of the non-Māori rate.

• READ MORE: Māori vaccine equity scheme criticism blows back on Seymour
• Other Local Democracy Reporting stories at Asia Pacific Report

Te Whānau o Waipareira CEO John Tamihere said Seymour was trying to sabotage attempts to make the rollout more equitable.

He said his clinics had vaccinated five times as many Pākehā as Māori and Pasifika.

Independent writer, researcher and advisor Rāwiri Taonui, who focuses on covid-19 in Māori communities, said the story was similar around the country and different strategies were now needed to turn around low vaccine uptake by Māori.

“At the moment our main strategy is to have mass vaccination events and some are prioritised for Māori and Pasifika but what’s happening is those events are actually being swamped by Pākehā, quite a lot of them,” Taonui said.

“A better strategy would be to collate information about where whānau live or have whānau gather at marae and have mobile vaccination units go out to the community.”

Booking ‘navigators’
Taonui said another idea would be to bring in booking “navigators” to help Māori, especially kaumātua, who are finding it difficult to book online, and to help whānau book group vaccinations.

In the Whanganui District Health Board region, nearly 54,500 doses of Pfizer have been delivered – just over 49 percent of the total due to be delivered in the local rollout.

Māori health providers are running clinics throughout the region, including in rural and isolated centres and in marae communities, and on Friday a walk-in clinic is being held at Te Ao Hou Marae in Whanganui from 10am-2pm.

• New Zealand reported 21 new community cases of covid-19 in the country today. Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield said all the new cases were all in Auckland. This follows three days in a row with 20 new cases.

Local Democracy Reporting is a public interest news service supported by RNZ, the News Publishers’ Association and NZ On Air. Asia Pacific Report supports this project.

Pacific health providers say a major New Zealand government funding boost is not just a recognition of the critical role they play in reaching Pasifika communities, but of the urgent and sustained response that the delta variant demands

The government has announced a NZ$26 million package of support for the Pacific community which is bearing the brunt of the current covid-19 Delta outbreak.

It also announced a $23 million boost in funding to Whānau Ora to be divided between its three agencies including Pasifika Futures.

• READ MORE: Covid-19 case numbers: 28 new community cases in NZ
• Other NZ covid lockdown reports

The funding comes with immediacy because health officials recognise the fast moving delta variant demands an urgent response.

Especially since the number of Pacific people infected is high, as is the number of Pacific peoples isolating.

Director of Pacific Health, Gerardine Clifford-Lidstone said the funding would firstly secure the services of Pacific provider networks in Auckland and Wellington regions where Pasifika needed the most, and immediate, support.

“The second is to support mobile services and ensure that people can get tested in the home and vaccinated in the home and have other health issues dealt with,” Clifford-Lindstone said.

“And then the third one is communications to ensure that our communities have access to information around vaccines and that needs to be in ethnic specific languages.”

Maintaining momentum
The boost will help maintain momentum in the vaccine rollout and ongoing testing, which Pasifika Futures’ CEO Debbie Sorensen said had been met with a great response by the Pacific community

“And the Whānau Ora money will of course support people being able to stay in their bubbles. Being able to stay safe and keep their families fed and a roof over their families. We’ve had an assurance from Te Puni Kōkiri that we will have that money in our hands tomorrow,” Sorensen said.

She said there was no question that until now Pacific providers generally had been under-funded.

“They were not funded with any flexibility to meet a surge demand. So this will go some way to making sure that as a community we’re able to respond and support our families over the next fortnight but also to be looking into the future about what we do next,” she said.

Tevita Funaki of Pacific health and social support provider The Fono welcomes the funding boost.

He said the health and social strains from this outbreak would have a significantly longer tail than those the community experienced after lockdowns last year.

And with the level of demand for The Fono’s food packages this time around, families needed more sustained support.

Welfare support initiative
“The welfare support, so there’s a welfare support initiative that is supporting especially those that are in isolation. We’ll be able to maintain that because now we will have the ability to re-deploy staff into it. So this will help not only to scale it up, or help to resource it, but also will help to continue it, at least for the short to medium term,” said Funaki.

The innovation manager of Pacific health, disability and social services provider Vaka Tautua, Bernice Mene, said the boost made public health sense given what her organisation had seen working throughout the country.

“And a lot of the feedback is that they are keen for vaccinations but the access, there’s problems with access. And our disabilities community as well. It’s being able to access the vaccination stations, the essential workers or the workers as well,” Mene said.

She said increased support for communication, getting Pacific communities the essential information in a way they could access was also vital in the pandemic response.

• New Zealand health authorities have reported 28 new cases of covid-19 in the community today.
• The total number of cases in the current outbreak is now 764. Of those, 33 cases have recovered and there are 731 active cases.
• There were 49 new community cases reported yesterday.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Arrested medical practitioner Dr Jone Hawea has claimed that Fiji police officers acted irresponsibly by not following to covid-19 safety protocols and exposed him to transmission of the disease, reports The Fiji Times.

Fiji Human Rights Anti-Discrimination Commission director Ashwin Raj reported this after a commission team visited Dr Hawea at Totogo Police Station in Suva on Thursday, following his arrest in Lautoka on Tuesday.

He has since been released.

• READ MORE: NFP leader accuses Fiji government of creating ‘police state’ after arrest

Dr Hawea was being questioned and investigated for allegedly sharing misinformation regarding covid-19.

Raj said Dr Hawea was in sound health, but had expressed concerns about his safety and his right to health.

“He [Dr Hawea] has questioned the rationale behind his transfer from Lautoka Police Station to Totogo when the Suva-Nausori corridor, as he described to the commission, is a “hot spot” for covid positive cases,” Raj said.

‘Risk of transmission’
“He stated that some police officers acted irresponsibly by not adhering to the covid-19 safety protocols and exposing him to risk of transmission.”

Raj also confirmed Dr Hawea had access to legal counsel. Questions sent to police spokeswoman Ana Naisoro remained unanswered.

Fijivillage News reports that Dr Hawea had been released from police custody on Thursday night.

The news website reported that the police stated that ordinary Fijians got arrested during curfew hours and Dr Hawea was no exception.

Republished with permission.

New Zealand is sending 100,000 vaccine doses and additional financial support to Fiji for nursing staff as the country’s covid-19 death toll passed 250.

Fiji reported 1100 new cases and 13 more deaths today, bringing the total death toll to 254.

Of the deaths, 252 of them have come from the April outbreak of the delta variant of covid-19.

• READ MORE: Other Fiji covid crisis reports

Foreign Affairs Minister Nanaia Mahuta said New Zealand paid for 100,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine directly from the Spanish government to meet Fiji’s immediate vaccine needs.

The vaccines were due to arrive today.

“Our thoughts remain with Fiji during this incredibly challenging period,” Mahuta said in a statement.

Earlier this year, the government committed to providing up to 500,000 doses.

Commitment still stands
Mahuta said that commitment still stood.

“AstraZeneca is Fiji’s vaccine of choice and these doses will further support the excellent work Fiji is doing in vaccinating its population.”

Mahuta said the nation’s vaccination drive was coming along.

“Fiji’s vaccination programme is progressing well with 25 percent now fully vaccinated, and first doses provided to 82 percent of the population.

“Our commitment stands and New Zealand will continue to work with Fiji to confirm its remaining vaccine requirements.”

She said the government was also funding for 190 Fiji graduate nurses for a three-month period.

“The recruitment of these nurses not only supports Fiji’s response in the short term, but also contributes to the long-term resilience of the health sector.”

NZ responds to requests
New Zealand has also responded to a range of other requests from Fiji.

“In the last two weeks New Zealand has supported the provision and retrofitting of ambulances and medical equipment, provided funding support to civil society partners and begun delivering 700,000 testing swabs and privacy screens for medical facilities,” Mahuta said.

These initiatives build on previous packages of support New Zealand has provided Fiji, including $40 million of financial assistance, PPE, testing equipment and other relief supplies.

New Zealand has also deployed two rotations of medical personnel to the joint Australia New Zealand Medical Assistance Team.

“We remain in close contact with the government of Fiji and civil society partners to support further requests,” Mahuta said.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

As with much of Indonesia, the country’s easternmost provinces of Papua and West Papua are struggling to contain the spread of covid-19, with the delta variant on the loose.

In their latest update, health authorities in Papua province reported 33,826 confirmed cases of the virus to date, as well as 794 known deaths. In West Papua province, there were 18,027 confirmed cases and 278 deaths.

Earlier this week, the Papua provincial health spokesman Silvanus Sumule spoke to media outside a hospital in downtown Jayapura, explaining that hospital capacity had passed 100 percent, while they were short of oxygen tanks for covid patients.

• READ MORE: Other West Papuan covid pandemic reports

Patients were being treated in corridors or outside the building, the sort of desperate scenes being experienced across Indonesia, which has become the latest epicentre of the pandemic in Asia, with more than 3.2 million cases and 90,000 deaths from covid.

But the health system in Papua is weaker than most other parts of the republic, adding to fears that the virus is on track to cause devastation in indigenous Papuan communities.

A human rights adviser to the Papuan People’s Assembly, Wensi Fatubun, said that with the Delta variant rampaging through communities, Papua’s provincial government had sought a full lockdown for the month of August.

“So the local government announced for the lockdown. But the national government doesn’t want Papua province locked down, and to use different restrictions on community activities.”

With Jakarta having overruled Papua’s local government on the matter, the onus goes on how people respond to the restrictions on gatherings as well as safety measures. But adherence to these basic measures has been mixed in Papua during the pandemic.

“We are really worried with covid-19. If it goes to the remote areas, we don’t know, maybe many, many indigenous Papuans will die, because there’s not enough doctors, nurses, and also health facilities,” Fatubun said.

Across Jayapura, there has been a spate of burials in recent days — another sign of the surge in covid-19 cases, which could be significantly higher than official statistics show.

‘Many Papuans are dying’
To avert the death rate growing more out of control, the national government of President Joko Widodo is focussing on efforts to vaccinate as many people as possible in the coming weeks and months.

So far around 22 percent of the eligible population of 208 million have had at least a first dose of the vaccine, and around 10 percent have had two doses.

The moderator of the Papuan Council of Churches, Reverend Benny Giay said many West Papuans were resisting the vaccine rollout, chiefly because of the role of Indonesian security forces who he said indigenous Papuans deeply mistrusted.

“In the past few months, in several districts, it’s the military and police who accompanied medical teams who go promoting the vaccines. But people turn them away. It’s very difficult to convince the people,” he said.

Given the ongoing violent conflict between Indonesian security forces and West Papuan independence fighters, as well as decades of human rights abuses and racism against Papuans, Reverend Giay said the resistance was understandable.

“The reality here is that they’ve gone through this crisis and violence, and the government is involving military and police to be part of this and we don’t like that.”

Warning against misinformation
Reverend Giay wants his people to get vaccinated, and is urging Papuans to not be dissuaded by misinformation propagated on social media. He suggested outside help was required.

“Many Papuans are dying. We’ve been calling international community for help — maybe the International Red Cross, maybe a humanitarian intervention to convince our people (to get vaccinated).”

This proposal is highly unlikely to be accepted by the Indonesian government which has long restricted outside access to Papua.

Jakarta continues with a business-as-usual approach in the remote eastern region, and is sticking to its plans for Papua to host the Indonesia National Games in October which will bring in many people form other parts of the country.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

New Zealand’s first mass vaccination event is getting under way in Manukau where 16,000 people are due to receive a covid-19 vaccine in the next three days.

The Vodafone Events Centre in Manukau has been set up with 242 booths, and people will file in at their allotted time to take a seat and wait for a vaccinator to come to them.

Just 12 vaccinators will inject roughly one person each a minute.

• READ MORE: RNZ mass vaccinations live news feed
• Concerns raised over long lines at first mass vacination event
• Covid-19 in Fiji: 1301 new cases, nine more deaths confirmed

Just got my 1st vaccination jab (Pfizer/Biotech at the Vodafone Events Centre,Manukau,Auckland pic.twitter.com/5LwzN2E7YH

— Samson Mudapakati (@SMudapakati) July 29, 2021

#COVID19nz mass vaccination event in Manukau is running about an hour behind schedule. I turned up on time for my 10:40 slot only to hear calls for 09:50.#nzpol

— (@bucslife76) July 29, 2021

Am at the mass vaccination event on Manukau. Absolute shambles. Running so late already thay you need to wait minimum 1 hour before your appointment time before you even get registered.

— Emma (@flashemma) July 29, 2021

They can work quickly because other people are doing the logistics and health checks.

After a rocky start, with a slow uptake of bookings initially, the event is now fully booked and organisers say they will not be able to take any walk-ins.

Earlier in the week, Manukau City Councillor Fa’anana Efeso Collins’ had criticised communication by health authorities with the target people after less than a quarter of those initially sent invitations for the event booked a slot.

He called the communications plan to reach Māori, Pacific and vulnerable communities an “absolute failure”.

Surge of late bookings
RNZ had reported that initially about 12,500 people were sent invitations, with people urged to get their whānau to book too.

However, only 3000 of those booked a place. A surge of bookings late in the week turned this situation around.

Auckland District Health Board (DHB) says the event is on an international model, designed to get large groups of people vaccinated efficiently and safely in a short period of time at a single venue.

“People coming for the vaccine will come into the arena, queue up and then be directed to a seat in a booth.

“Once seated, all of the services will be delivered there. This minimises movement and disruption and allows for a higher throughput of people. We will have 12 vaccinators operating each day of the event.

“A vaccinator will come with a trolley and administer the vaccine then people will be required to wait in the booth for observation for 20 minutes.”

There will be a team of medically trained observers assigned to a row who will monitor people and provide assistance if needed.

Once the 20-minute observation period is up people will be taken by shuttle back to the Manukau Institute of Technology (MIT) campus.

Welcome to the Olympics of vaccination! Starting today at the Vodafone Events Centre in Manukau City. Our first mass vaccination event will vaccinate more than 15,000 people over the next 3 days. pic.twitter.com/E3donGBTlN

— Ayesha Verrall (@drayeshaverrall) July 29, 2021

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

The dream of putting a smile on his mother’s face on his graduation day from university has become one that will never happen for Gabriel Gade, after his mother succumbed to the coronavirus that has killed dozens of people in Fiji.

“My ultimate dream was to make her proud of all her sacrifices, battles in life and the love she gave me over the last 21 years of my life,” he told Asia Pacific Report.

“My mother had to work all the time to pay off the mortgage, and I could tell that she was exhausted most of the time, but I think it was her love for her children that kept her going every day.

• READ MORE: Fiji reports 715 new covid-19 cases as death toll passes 200

His mother, Suliana Bulavakarua, worked as a registered nurse at the Colonial War Memorial Hospital (CWMH), the largest healthcare facility in the country, where his family believes she contracted the virus while pregnant.

After she tested positive for covid-19 on July 16, she was transported to the Covid-care facility in Suva, leaving behind Gade and his sister at home as their father was working outside of the mainland.

Her children also tested positive for the virus but have recovered. Gade was vaccinated with the first dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine while his mother was awaiting the Moderna vaccine that was to be administered to pregnant women.

Her daughter was not eligible for the vaccine as she was under the age of 18.

Her condition worsened
Her condition got worse on July 18 and was advised by attending physicians to deliver her baby by caesarean section.

The 44-year-old gave life to a baby girl but the battle with covid-19 was so intense that it soon ended her life.

“It was late at night on Wednesday [July 21] when my phone rang and I did not answer because it was a new number and it was late as well. However, little did I know the hospital was calling me to inform us of our mother’s passing,” says Gade.

“A team from the hospital knocked on our doors on Thursday morning and relayed the news that broke my sister and I into tears. The world suddenly stopped as I lost the one person I owe everything to.

“My mind ran wild but hours later I had to compose myself for my family, especially my sisters who will now grow up without a mother.

The Lau native said the teachings of his mother was something he would hold dear to his heart and would use in the upbringing of his sisters.

“My mother taught me to be generous, loving and to care for people that needed my help.

“I remember a night where I would do my assignments on my study table in our living room and during her days off she would sit on the couch and then she would try and make small talk.

“My mom and I had this relationship where she would always be pressed to do things like for me to graduate. My mom was always supportive of my endeavours.

“I love you so much mom.”

The “fallen hero” is survived by her husband and three children.

Fiji has recorded 715 cases of Covid-19 and 11 deaths – including an unvaccinated health worker – in the last 24 hours to 8am yesterday. https://t.co/CcvTZsXk1n

— RNZ Pacific (@RNZPacific) July 27, 2021

Healthcare workers remember fallen hero
The loss of Bulavakarua was not only for the family but for healthcare workers around the country as they took to social media to express their feelings.

A nurse posted on Facebook that Bulavakarua was the talk of the operation room at the hospital she worked in as they all reminisced her dedication to saving lives in the country.

Health Secretary Dr James Fong, in a televised address, announced the passing of the healthcare worker and said she was one of the many who risked their lives to save people from the deadly delta variant of the virus.

“This current crisis is demonstrating the essential, tireless, innovative and too-often undervalued role of health workers and our frontline colleagues in ensuring strong, resilient health systems for everyone, everywhere,” he said.

“They work long hours, sacrifice time with their families, and endure the stresses that this pandemic places upon them as individuals, professionals, and upon the entire health system.

“Delivering health services in an environment of constraint resources will often mean providing access to life saving care at the expense of comfort.

Meanwhile, healthcare workers are currently looking after 17,937 people living with the deadly virus in the nation where 195 people have died.

Fiji’s covid-19 case count stands at 24,424 since March 2020 with 6191 recoveries.

Josefa Babitu is a final-year student journalist at the University of the South Pacific (USP). He is also the current student editor for Wansolwara, USP Journalism’s student training newspaper and online publication. He is a contributor to Asia Pacific Report.

France and French Polynesia have agreed to jointly spend US$60 million to build 17 cyclone shelters across the Tuamotu archipelago.

This was announced on Manihi atoll, where the visiting French President Emmanuel Macron inaugurated the construction site for a shelter for the atoll’s 600 inhabitants.

Macron stopped on Manihi on his way back to Tahiti after a visit to Hiva Oa.

The French Polynesian President, Edouard Fritch, who is travelling with Macron, told local media that he asked Paris for another loan to cope with problems at the social welfare agency CPS and Air Tahiti Nui.

Wallis delegation to meet Macron in Tahiti
A delegation from Wallis and Futuna is expected to fly to French Polynesia today to meet President Macron.

According to the French Prefect in Wallis, Macron originally had Wallis and Futuna on his itinerary, but called off a visit because of the restrictions linked to the covid-19 pandemic.

Prefect Herve Jonathan told local television Macron had wanted to mark this week’s 60th anniversary of the territory’s current status as a French overseas collectivity.

He said the 14-member delegation would include representatives of the three traditional kingdoms as well as the Catholic archbishop.

In March, Wallis and Futuna had a covid-19 community outbreak, which prompted a strict lockdown.

An immediate immunisation drive inoculated about half the population within two weeks but almost half the population rejected the vaccination offer.

Four hundred people caught the virus and seven died.

Detention for Tahiti man insulting Macron
A man in French Polynesia has been taken into custody for questioning for insulting President Macron shortly after he had arrived at Tahiti’s airport.

Tahiti-infos reports the individual joined demonstrators lined up along the route of the presidential convoy to Tahiti’s hospital.

Demonstrations by anti-nuclear groups and the pro-independence opposition are banned for the duration of the president’s four-day visit.

Reports say the groups distanced themselves from the individual, saying he was not one of their members.

He is due in court and expected to be tried for insulting a person in public authority.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

A pro-independence movement in West Papua has appealed to several Western countries — including New Zealand — to provide urgent humanitarian help by supplying covid vaccines directly to the Papuans to cope with the “double crisis” in the Indonesian-ruled region.

Benny Wenda, interim president of the Provisional Government of West Papua, said today he had made the appeal by writing to the foreign ministers of Britain, Australia, New Zealand and the US.

“I have also written to the President of the European Commission, the WHO [World Health Organisation] and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights regarding the escalating covid-19 situation in our land,” he said in a statement.

• READ MORE: MRP, MRPB to challenge Jokowi in Constitutional Court regarding Otsus Law revision
• The Jakarta Post: New deal, old approach over West Papua
• ‘We’ll be extinct,’ warns West Papuan churches, call for halt to ‘racist’ Otsus
• Papuan People’s Assembly deems Otsus Law evaluation ‘unlawful’
• Indonesian lawmakers adopt unpopular bill to reshape Papua
• Other West Papua special autonomy law articles

“This new crisis is a further existential threat to my people.”

Indonesia had caused a double crisis for the people of West Papua by launching military operations in the middle of the pandemic, Wenda said, as he had warned.

“Just yesterday, villagers from the West Moskona district were attacked by troops after attending a peaceful worship session against ‘Special Autonomy’, fleeing to the forests and the city of Bintuni,” he said.

“Woman and children are afraid to return to their villages in case the military and police arrest or attack them.”

50,000 plus displaced
“More than 50,000 people have been displaced in Nduga, Puncak and Intan Jaya over the past two and a half years. Their homes have been destroyed, their churches burned and their schools occupied by soldiers.

“They are left in internal displacement camps, where the virus will spread rapidly. Already in the cities, patients are being turned away or treated in cars outside the hospital.”

Western countries and the WHO had an urgent moral obligation to give vaccine doses direct the local Papuan government for distribution, Wenda said.

“As the 2018 Asmat health crisis showed, Jakarta cannot be trusted with the health of the West Papuan people,” he said.

“Over nearly 60 years of colonisation we have seen a chronic failure to develop health facilities in West Papua, leaving us dying on top of the natural riches Indonesia is extracting. If Jakarta is allowed to hold the reigns of vaccine development, my people will suffer further.”

Wenda said the developments were part of a “continued genocide against my people”.

“Our forests have been torn down, our mountains decapitated, our way of life destroyed. Indonesia restricts healthcare and enforces a colonial education whilst killing anyone who speaks out for self-determination,” Wenda said.

“Launching military operations in the middle of a pandemic is a policy designed to further wipe out our population. We need urgent international assistance, direct to the local Papuan government, not through the colonial occupier.”

• Full statement by the ULMWP

RNZ Pacific

Fiji has recorded a daily record 1405 new cases of covid-19 in the 24 hours to 8am on Friday.

That compares to 1220 cases and 10 deaths in the previous 24-hour period.

The government also confirmed six more deaths last night, taking the death toll to 80 – 78 of these from the latest outbreak that began in April.

• READ MORE: How Fiji’s Antonio escaped death from ‘normal flu’ that was actually covid-19
• Other Fiji covid pandemic articles

Health Secretary Dr James Fong said all six patients were unvaccinated.

“A 58-year old man from Tacirua presented to a medical facility on Wednesday with severe covid symptoms including shortness of breath. His condition worsened at the health centre and he died on the same day.

“An 82-year-old man from Waila presented to a health facility in severe respiratory distress. He was retrieved by a medical team to the Colonial War Memorial Hospital.”

Dr Fong said the man’s condition worsened at the CWM Hospital and he died two days after admission on July 12.

Unwell with symptoms
His family reported that he had been unwell with symptoms that included fever, and cough, Dr Fong said.

“The third covid-19 death to report is a 34-year-old man from Koronivia also presented to a health facility in severe respiratory distress on July 12. His condition worsened at the centre and he died on the same day.

“A 68-year-old man from Valelevu presented to the CWM Hospital with covid symptoms on July 14. His condition worsened in the hospital and he died on the same day he was admitted.

“The fifth death is a 76-year-old woman from Narere who presented to a healthcare facility with severe covid symptoms including shortness of breath. She was retrieved by a medical team to CWM Hospital on July 12 where her condition worsened and she died on the same day.

“A 92-year-old man from Ba was retrieved by a medical team from an isolation facility and transferred to Lautoka Hospital. His condition worsened in hospital and he died four days after being admitted on July 15.”

Dr Fong said three other people, who tested positive to the virus, had died but their deaths have been classified as due to serious pre-existing medical conditions and not caused by covid-19.

More than 11,000 positive people in isolation
Six other deaths are under investigation, he said.

“We also recorded 34 ovid-19 positive patients who died from the serious medical conditions that they had before they contracted the virus; these are not classified as Covid-19 deaths.

“There have been 470 new recoveries reported since the last update, which means that there are now 11,959 active cases. There have been 15,221 cases during the outbreak that started in April 2021.

“We have recorded a total of 15,291 cases in Fiji since the first case was reported in March 2020, with 3,218 recoveries.”

Dr Fong said a total of 10,356 individuals were screened and 1893 swabbed at stationary screening clinics in the last 24 hours, bringing the cumulative total to 312,572 individuals screened and 52,386 swabbed to date.

“Our mobile screening teams screened a total of 4,197 individuals and swabbed 435 in the last 24 hours. This brings our cumulative total to 712,328 individuals screened and 60,855 swabbed by our mobile teams to date.”

Dr Fong said a total of 216,869 samples have been tested since this outbreak started in April 2021, with 259,734 tested since testing began in March 2020.

“3678 tests have been reported for July 14. Testing number data for one lab is pending for July 13-14. Based on available testing numbers, the national 7-day daily test average is 3943 tests per day or 4.5 tests per 1000 population.

“These numbers are expected to increase once all lab testing number data is received. The national 7-day average daily test positivity is 19.2 percent and continues on an upward trend.”

The World Health Organisation’s test positivity threshold is five percent.

As of the 15 July, 384,480 adults in Fiji have received their first dose of the vaccine and 75,448 have received their second doses, Dr Fong said.

“This means that 66 percent of the target population have received at least one dose and 12.9 percent are now fully vaccinated nation-wide.

“Fijians can check the Ministry’s vaccine dashboard to find real-time data on first-dose and second-dose numbers at the national, divisional and sub-divisional levels.

“The 7-day average of new cases per day is 824 cases per day or 932 cases per million population per day. Average daily case numbers are increasing, together with cases of severe disease and deaths.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

• Fiji Health Ministry covid dashboard

Indonesia is currently experiencing a massive spike in covid-19 infection and deaths, as experts (including myself) have unfortunately been predicting.

The country recorded its largest single-day increase in new cases on July 13, with more than 47,000 infections.

And this is likely to be a huge undercount because too few people are getting tested.

• READ MORE: Why is delta such a worry? It’s more infectious, probably causes more severe disease, and challenges our vaccines
• 3 ways to vaccinate the world and make sure everyone benefits, rich and poor
• Other Indonesian covid crisis articles

The positivity rate — the percentage of people taking covid tests who return a positive result — currently sits at 26 percent, according to Our World In Data, which indicates Indonesia is almost certainly missing many more cases.

Local research found 44 percent of Jakarta residents had antibodies against the virus. Only 8 percent had actually been confirmed cases.

One reason for the low testing rates is a lack of access to covid tests. Free tests are only available in health-care facilities for people with symptoms or who have been in contact with confirmed cases.

The price private laboratories charge for covid tests can be prohibitive.

What’s gone wrong?
The central government had resisted lockdowns, despite the hospital system hitting crisis point, and has instead prioritised keeping the economy open.

Over the past 16 months, health authorities have struggled to implement contact tracing systems, where people who may have come in contact with the virus are asked to isolate to stop them spreading the virus.

The government has downplayed the pandemic since the beginning, both underestimating the risk in its pandemic planning, and understating the harms in its public communication.

There has been little transparency and poor public communication about the disease.

These shortcomings have put Indonesia in an extremely vulnerable position. The islands of Java and Bali in particular are seeing record-breaking numbers of new cases and deaths.

The faster-spreading delta variant is playing a significant role. Genomic analysis shows delta has displaced other SARS-CoV-2 variants which first circulated in Indonesia.

What has the government done so far?
On July 1, the government announced a semi-lockdown for Java and Bali. Under the restrictions, all employees in non-essential industries must work from home, while 50 percent of employees in essential industries, including finance, can work in an office.

Critical sectors, such as health facilities and food outlets, may operate with total capacity on-site.

Shopping malls must close, and grocery stores and supermarkets can operate until 8pm daily at 50 percent capacity. Food outlets can only offer takeaway or delivery services.

Public transport may operate at 70 percent capacity. Air and long-distance bus and train travellers must produce a vaccine card indicating at least one dose of a covid vaccine.

Face masks are mandatory in public areas.

Authorities have instructed security forces to enforce the protocols.

On July 7, these restrictions were expanded to all other parts of the country.

A large part of the current strategy focuses on covid vaccination. By the end of June the country was administering one million vaccine doses a day, and has maintained a similar rate since then.

But Indonesia currently lacks a robust system of testing, contact tracing and isolating, which should be the main strategy in dealing with a pandemic; the goal of restrictions should be to supplement and strengthen this strategy.

When it will reach the peak?
Based on my calculations, if the restrictions and mask mandates are adhered to, I estimate covid cases in Indonesia could peak in late July or early August, with new case numbers rising to 200,000 a day.

But if restrictions are ineffective, we could see up to 400,000 new daily cases at the peak.

I base these projections on a few factors. I start with the assumption that reported cases are a massive undercount. Then I use an estimate of the spreading rate of covid under certain assumptions, including whether or not restrictions are adhered to.

I also use the number of reported deaths and work backwards to estimate how many cases are likely to have caused that many deaths.

For example, over the last few days Indonesia has recorded around 1000 deaths per day. Deaths lag cases, so let’s look at new daily cases from three weeks ago — they were around 15,000 a day.

But if we assume a case fatality rate of around 2 percent, that means 1000 deaths could translate to 50,000 cases.

Because reported deaths are likely to be an undercount too, that figure could be more like 100,000 cases. So the real number of cases could be three to six times higher than reported cases.

And that was three weeks ago.

I also estimate the number of deaths each day will peak at the end of July or early August, with 1000 to 2300 deaths per day. The number of people in hospital and ICUs could reach 93,000 and 20,000 per day, respectively.

What challenges must be overcome?
The Indonesian government faces a number of challenges in controlling the covid crisis.

Some parts of Indonesia are densely populated, including the covid epicentres Java, Bali and Madura, which makes it easier for the virus to spread. Therefore, the success of Indonesia’s pandemic control will depend on how the government handles the situation on these islands.

Hospitals are increasingly becoming overwhelmed with some running out of oxygen.

Other challenges include regional disparities in covid vaccination rates, the spread of false covid information, vaccine hesitancy, a lack of universal access to clean water, low immunisation coverage among children, and the poor socioeconomic status of most of the population.

This makes it difficult for the government to apply stricter public health measures to contain the virus, as we’ve seen in more socioeconomically advantaged countries.

Australia’s role
As a high GDP country which has been successful in suppressing covid, Australia has an obligation to help protect Indonesia and the region by providing international aid.

Last week, Australia announced a support package, with 2.5 million AstraZeneca vaccines, along with oxygen supplies, rapid testing kits, and ventilators.

Bilateral and regional cooperation is essential during the covid crisis; no country can be safe until all countries are safe.

Dicky Budiman, MD, epidemiologist and PhD candidate on Global Health Security, Griffith University. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

Villagers and surrounding farmers in Labasa on Fiji’s Vanua Levu island turned up in big numbers for the covid-19 vaccination drive held at Nakorowiri village.

Opposition SODELPA parliamentarian Mosese Bulitavu gave his house for medical officials to use for the AstraZeneca vaccination drive.

“The villagers came in numbers volunteering themselves to get the jab and we are so thankful to the vaccination team for their commitment,” Bulitavu said.

• READ MORE: 15-year-old girl among latest Fiji covid deaths as virus cases soar over 11,000
• Other Fiji covid crisis reports

“This vaccination drive happened because we have pledged in the village to break the chain of community transmission by getting vaccinated so we are protected.

“Our loved ones and those around us too will get protected when we are vaccinated.”

Meanwhile, the average cases of covid-19 recorded per day within a period of seven days was 622, reports Health Secretary Dr James Fong.

He said the cases had increased daily with a number of people dying from the virus.

As of July 10, he said Fiji recorded 353,303 adults receiving their first dose of the vaccine and 66,635 had received their second doses.

He said this meant that 60.2 percent of the target population had received at least one dose and 11.4 percent were now fully vaccinated nationwide.

Republished with permission.

The Fiji government’s response to the covid-19 pandemic outbreak is an utter failure, but it is not too late to follow New Zealand’s lockdown example, an opposition leader says.

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern told media her advice was that the lockdown strategy had saved lives.

Fiji is in the grip of a covid-19 outbreak that has infected 791 people and left three more dead in the past day.

• READ MORE: SODELPA leader blasts PM, Attorney-General over Fiji covid ‘recklessness’
• Almost 6000 people battle covid-19 in Fiji – fears of new pandemic spike
• Backgrounder on the delta variant
• Other reports on the Fiji covid crisis
• LISTEN: ‘We are facing a very, very dire situation’ – Dr Biman Prasad (duration 17′:19″)

Fiji’s deputy opposition leader Professor Biman Prasad told RNZ’s Nine to Noon programme that the government’s strategy had been a complete failure and needed to change.

“Change the strategy now. It’s about life and death now. It’s about fixing the health public health emergency right now, which will also be good in the long term for the economy.”

“The stupid, stubborn, ego-driven policies of this government and the leadership of this government has been utter failure, you know, complete nonsense.”

He said people were fearful and anxious, and the government was putting all its eggs in one basket – vaccination.

‘People are dying’
“Vaccination is important, we’re encouraging people to get vaccinated. But right now we are having a public health emergency – people are dying, our health systems are giving up.”

It was not too late for the country to follow the examples of New Zealand and Australia and lock down, he said.

“If there is a proper planned lockdown with appropriate provision of support such as food rations, etc, for people in the lower income categories I think a lot of people will understand why the government would do that.”

Ardern told New Zealand media this afternoon it was up to the Fiji government to make its own decision, but offered some advice.

“Lockdown, for us, has saved lives and it’s also benefited our economy. But these choices are for governments,” she said.

“Our help and assistance will be there regardless of what strategy they adopt, they’re our neighbours and I think no one wants to see any country suffering under the full effects of an outbreak.”

Ardern said she had spoken to Fiji Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama last week and offered wide ranging support, having already provided NZ$40 million in aid, plus protective equipment, specialists, and offered future vaccines.

“Acknowledging that they of course have the right to make their own decisions.”

Fiji should seek more help
Dr Prasad said the government should seek more help from Australia and New Zealand to help with testing.

“People are dying, you know, on arrival to the hospitals because the health system cannot cope … if the cases continue to rise – and more and more people seek medical attention – any health system is gonna give up,” he said.

“I’m afraid that’s what is happening right now in Fiji.”

Dr Prasad said he suspected the government was ignoring advice, and its messaging had been contradictory.

“It’s very, very clear that this government has completely lost the plot.”

“They need to convince the people … they haven’t explained very clearly as to what and why they’re doing what they’re doing right now.”

The people of Fiji were grateful for the assistance from Australia and New Zealand, he said, but the Fiji government should ask for more help in the form of support for those who may be unable to care for their children and put food on the table.

Donations to help Fiji could also be sent to non-government organisations that were already providing help, he said.

Civil society groups in Fiji have urged the government to release data to help them provide an effective response to the crisis.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

While Australians may be focused on the havoc the Delta variant is wreaking on our shores, Delta is in fact driving waves of covid infections all around the world.

With the World Health Organisation (WHO) warning Delta will rapidly become the dominant strain, let’s take a look at this variant in a global context.

The Delta variant (B.1.617.2) emerged quietly in the Indian state of Maharashtra in October 2020. It barely caused a ripple at a time when India was reporting around 40,000 to 80,000 cases a day, most being the Alpha variant (B.1.1.7) first found in the United Kingdom.

• READ MORE: What’s the ‘Delta plus’ variant? And can it escape vaccines? An expert explains
• The symptoms of the Delta variant appear to differ from traditional covid symptoms. Here’s what to look out for

That changed in April when India experienced a massive wave of infections peaking at close to 400,000 daily cases in mid-May. The Delta variant rapidly emerged as the dominant strain in India.

The WHO designated Delta as a variant of concern on May 11, making it the fourth such variant.

The Delta variant rapidly spread around the world and has been identified in at least 98 countries to date. It’s now the dominant strain in countries as diverse as the UK, Russia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Australia and Fiji.

And it’s on the rise.

In the United States, Delta made up one in five covid cases in the two weeks up to June 19, compared to just 2.8 percent in the two weeks up to May 22.

Meanwhile, the most recent Public Health England weekly update reported an increase of 35,204 Delta cases since the previous week. More than 90 percent of sequenced cases were the Delta variant.

In just two months, Delta has replaced Alpha as the dominant strain of SARS-CoV-2 in the UK. The increase is primarily in younger age groups, a large proportion of whom are unvaccinated.

2 key mutations
Scientists have identified more than 20 mutations in the Delta variant, but two may be crucial in helping it transmit more effectively than earlier strains. This is why early reports from India called it a “double mutant”.

The first is the L452R mutation, which is also found in the Epsilon variant, designated by the WHO as a variant of interest. This mutation increases the spike protein’s ability to bind to human cells, thereby increasing its infectiousness.

Preliminary studies also suggest this mutation may aid the virus in evading the neutralising antibodies produced by both vaccines and previous infection.

The second is a novel T478K mutation. This mutation is located in the region of the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein which interacts with the human ACE2 receptor, which facilitates viral entry into lung cells.

The recently described Delta Plus variant carries the K417N mutation too. This mutation is also found in the Beta variant, against which covid vaccines may be less effective.

One good thing about the Delta variant is the fact researchers can rapidly track it because its genome contains a marker the previously dominant Alpha variant lacks.

This marker — known as the “S gene target” — can be seen in the results of PCR tests used to detect covid-19. So researchers can use positive S-target hits as a proxy to quickly map the spread of Delta, without needing to sequence samples fully.

Why is Delta a worry?
The most feared consequences of any variant of concern relate to infectiousness, severity of disease, and immunity conferred by previous infection and vaccines.

WHO estimates Delta is 55 percent more transmissible than the Alpha variant, which was itself around 50 percent more transmissible than the original Wuhan virus.

That translates to Delta’s effective reproductive rate (the number of people on average a person with the virus will infect, in the absence of controls such as vaccination) being five or higher. This compares to two to three for the original strain.

There has been some speculation the Delta variant reduces the so-called “serial interval”; the period of time between an index case being infected and their household contacts testing positive. However, in a pre-print study (a study which hasn’t yet been peer-reviewed), researchers in Singapore found the serial interval of household transmission was no shorter for Delta than for previous strains.

One study from Scotland, where the Delta variant is predominating, found Delta cases led to 85 percent higher hospital admissions than other strains. Most of these cases, however, were unvaccinated.

The same study found two doses of Pfizer offered 92 percent protection against symptomatic infection for Alpha and 79 percent for Delta. Protection from the AstraZeneca vaccine was substantial but reduced: 73 percent for Alpha versus 60 percent for Delta.

A study by Public Health England found a single dose of either vaccine was only 33 percent effective against symptomatic disease compared to 50 percent against the Alpha variant. So having a second dose is extremely important.

In a pre-print article, Moderna revealed their mRNA vaccine protected against Delta infection, although the antibody response was reduced compared to the original strain. This may affect how long immunity lasts.

A global challenge to controlling the pandemic
The Delta variant is more transmissible, probably causes more severe disease, and current vaccines don’t work as well against it.

WHO warns low-income countries are most vulnerable to Delta as their vaccination rates are so low. New cases in Africa increased by 33 percent over the week to June 29, with covid-19 deaths jumping 42 percent.

There has never been a time when accelerating the vaccine rollout across the world has been as urgent as it is now.

WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Gebreyesus has warned that in addition to vaccination, public health measures such as strong surveillance, isolation and clinical care remain key. Further, tackling the Delta variant will require continued mask use, physical distancing and keeping indoor areas well ventilated.

Dr Michael Toole is professor of international health at the Burnet Institute. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

A video by a Fiji doctor on adverse side effects of the AstraZeneca vaccine has been misconstrued to support conspiracy theories and myths not supported by any scientific evidence, says Fiji College of General Practitioners president Dr Ram Raju.

He said the college “does not condone any member spreading false information to the public”.

He was commenting critically about the video made by Lautoka-based Dr Baladina Kavoa.

• READ MORE: Fiji reports record 522 new cases of covid-19 – three more deaths
• Sayed-Khaiyum leading Fiji into chaos, says women’s crisis centre leader
• Other reports on the Fiji covid crisis

“It is a time for all of our healthcare workers to unite and educate the public about the truth and dispel all fears,”Dr Raju said.

“Doctors are seen to be community leaders who should therefore exercise extreme care and restraint in posting any news on social media.

“The Fiji College of GP’s is fully behind the vaccination programme rolled out by the Ministry of Health and Medical Services and we support their efforts.”

He said they had held many seminars on this subject well before the first covid-19 case was identified in March last year and all the doubts were dispelled.

Vaccinations ‘can save lives’
“At the moment, the covid-19 vaccination is the only method which can save lives,” Dr Raju said.

“It’s just like giving vaccination for a host of other diseases to save lives, like measles, diphtheria, tetanus, pneumonia, hepatitis, etc.”

He said there were some vaccination side effects that were to be expected.

“Getting covid-19 is not a joke and these conspiracy theories need to be laid to rest.

“By vaccinating, you are protecting yourself, your family and the population of Fiji.”

• The Fiji Times did not publish any comment by Dr Kavoa.

Repeka Nasiko is a Fiji Times journalist. Republished with permission.

What is Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte’s solution to vaccine hesitancy among Filipinos? Threaten them with jail time.

Duterte, in a meeting with pandemic task force officials yesterday said he would order the arrest of people who refused to get vaccinated.

“Kung ayaw mo magpabakuna, ipaaresto kita at ang bakuna, itusok ko sa puwet mo. Putang ina, bwisit kayo,” said an irate Duterte in edited footage of the meeting aired on television.

• READ MORE: Other Philippines reports
• Duterte apologises for taking unapproved China jab

(If you don’t want to get vaccinated, I’ll have you arrested then I’ll inject a vaccine into your buttocks.)

“Magpabakuna kayo or ipakulong ko kayo sa selda (Get vaccinated or I’ll jail you in a cell),” he added.

He has also threatened to inject them with the version of anti-parasitic medicine Ivermectin intended for animals.

Duterte said his justification for such a drastic measure as arrest was the state of national emergency he declared over the country due to covid-19 and the dangers posed by unvaccinated people as possible “carriers” of the disease.

He conceded it was a “strong-arm” tactic for which he would find a legal way to enforce.

“I will think it over very hard, legally of course, in pursuance of a policy of crisis, this health issue,” said Duterte.

The President also said he would tell local government officials to “find” those who were unwilling to get vaccinated.

“I will order all the barangay captains to have a tally of all the people who refuse to be vaccinated,” said Duterte, adding that the Department of the Interior and Local Government should supervise the effort.

The Duterte administration is already notorious for its use of barangay lists to keep tabs on suspected drug users and peddlers, many of whom have ended up killed either in police operations or by unknown assailants.

Harshest vaccination policy
If Duterte makes good on his threat, his would probably be the harshest penalty globally for people unwilling to get vaccinated against covid-19 and would likely raise human rights concerns.

In Indonesia, its capital Jakarta announced it would fine people who refused to get vaccinated.

Will coercion and threat work among a majority of Filipinos unsure about getting their jabs? A Social Weather Stations survey conducted from late April to early May found that only three out of 10 Filipinos were willing to get vaccinated.

The top reason for this unwillingness was fear of side effects of vaccines being used — the most common is the Chinese Sinovac — and the belief that the vaccines were not safe or effective, according to SWS.

Lawmakers and civil society organisations have called on the government to ramp up its vaccination information drive to counter vaccine hesitancy.

Pacific Media Watch reports that the Philippines has logged at least 1.35 million infections and over 23,500 deaths since the pandemic began, but under 6 percent of its roughly 108 million residents have been inoculated with at least one dose.

The republic has now secured the delivery of 113 million doses from five vaccine manufacturers: Sinovac with 26 million doses, Sputnik V with 10 million doses, 20 million doses from Moderna, 17 million doses from AstraZeneca — and now a deal for 40 million doses from Pfizer.

Pia Ranada covers the Office of the President and Bangsamoro regional issues for Rappler. While helping out with desk duties, she also watches the environment sector and the local government of Quezon City. Rappler articles are republished by Asia Pacific Report with permission.

With the rollout of COVID-19 vaccines accelerating, people are increasingly asking which vaccine is best?

Even if we tried to answer this question, defining which vaccine is “best” is not simple.

Does that mean the vaccine better at protecting you from serious disease? The one that protects you from whichever variant is circulating near you? The one that needs fewer booster shots? The one for your age group?

Or is it another measure entirely?

• READ MORE: How to read results from COVID vaccine trials like a pro
• Can I get AstraZeneca now and Pfizer later? Why mixing and matching COVID vaccines could help solve many rollout problems

Even if we could define what’s “best”, it’s not as if you get a choice of vaccine. Until a suite of vaccines become available, the vast majority of people around the world will be vaccinated with whichever vaccine is available.

That’s based on available clinical data and health authorities’ recommendations, or by what your doctor advises if you have an underlying medical condition. So the candid answer to which COVID vaccine is “best” is simply the one available to you right now.

Still not convinced? Here’s why it’s so difficult to compare covid vaccines.

Clinical trial results only go so far
You might think clinical trials might provide some answers about which vaccine is “best”, particularly the large phase 3 trials used as the basis of approval by regulatory authorities around the world.

These trials, usually in tens of thousands of people, compare the number of COVID-19 cases in people who get the vaccine, versus those who get a placebo. This gives a measure of efficacy, or how well the vaccine works under the tightly controlled conditions of a clinical trial.

According to Google Trends, more and more people want to know.

And we know the efficacy of different COVID vaccines differ. For instance, we learned from clinical trials that the Pfizer vaccine reported an efficacy of 95% in preventing symptoms, whereas AstraZeneca had an efficacy of 62-90%, depending on the dosing regime.

But direct comparison of phase 3 trials is complex as they take place at different locations and times. This means rates of infection in the community, public health measures and the mix of distinct viral variants can vary. Trial participants can also differ in age, ethnicity and potential underlying medical conditions.

It’s tempting to compare COVID vaccines. But in a pandemic, when vaccines are scarce, that can be dangerous.

We might compare vaccines head to head
One way we can compare vaccine efficacy directly is to run head-to-head studies. These compare outcomes of people receiving one vaccine with those who receive another, in the same trial.

In these trials, how we measure efficacy, the study population and every other factor is the same. So we know any differences in outcomes must be down to differences between the vaccines.

For instance, a head-to-head trial is under way in the UK to compare the AstraZeneca and Valneva vaccines. The phase 3 trial is expected to be completed later this year.

How about out in the real world?
Until we wait for the results of head-to-head studies, there’s much we can learn from how vaccines work in the general community, outside clinical trials. Real-world data tells us about vaccine effectiveness (not efficacy).

And the effectiveness of COVID vaccines can be compared in countries that have rolled out different vaccines to the same populations.

For instance, the latest data from the UK show both Pfizer and AstraZeneca vaccines have similar effectiveness. They both reliably prevent COVID-19 symptoms, hospitalisation and death, even after a single dose.

So what at first glance looks “best” according to efficacy results from clinical trials doesn’t always translate to the real world.

What about the future?
The covid vaccine you get today is not likely to be your last. As immunity naturally wanes after immunisation, periodic boosters will become necessary to maintain effective protection.

There is now promising data from Spain that mix-and-matching vaccines is safe and can trigger very potent immune responses. So this may be a viable strategy to maintain high vaccine effectiveness over time.

In other words, the “best” vaccine might in fact be a number of different vaccines.

Variant viruses have started to circulate, and while current vaccines show reduced protection against these variants, they still protect.

Companies, including Moderna, are rapidly updating their vaccines to be administered as variant-specific boosters to combat this.

So, while one vaccine might have a greater efficacy in a phase 3 trial, that vaccine might not necessarily be “best” at protecting against future variants of concern circulating near you.

The best vaccine is the one you can get now
It is entirely rational to want the “best” vaccine available. But the best vaccine is the one available to you right now because it stops you from catching covid-19, reduces transmission to vulnerable members of our community and substantially reduces your risk of severe disease.

All available vaccines do this job and do it well. From a collective perspective, these benefits are compounded. The more people get vaccinated, the more the community becomes immune (also known as herd immunity), further curtailing the spread of covid-19.

The global pandemic is a highly dynamic situation, with emerging viral variants of concern, uncertain global vaccine supply, patchy governmental action and potential for explosive outbreaks in many regions.

So waiting for the perfect vaccine is an unattainable ambition. Every vaccine delivered is a small but significant step towards global normality.

Dr Wen Shi Lee is a postdoctoral researcher at the The Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity and Dr Hyon Xhi Tan is a postdoctoral researcher at the The Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

Anti-vax misinformation is throwing a spanner in the works for covid-19 vaccination programmes in Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands, with the prime ministers of both countries firing warnings at those spreading it.

PNG Prime Minister James Marape issued a blunt statement this week, saying his government had done everything possible to provide the vaccine during a time of global demand, and that if people did not get themselves vaccinated and then felt sick or died, they only had themselves to blame.

The tally of confirmed cases of vovid-19 in PNG has grown at 16,000 cases in four months, and almost 17,000 people have tested positive for the virus so far. Yet the rate of infections has tapered off from the highs of March.

• READ MORE: Other PNG, Solomon articles on the covid pandemic

The government has declared the situation under control, but is anxious to use its supply of AstraZeneca doses before they expire. About 100,000 doses sent through the COVAX programme facility need to be used within a month or they will go to waste.

A little more than 41,000 people in PNG have now had the vaccine, mostly essential workers and about 7000 health workers. But the figures are a drop in the bucket compared to the total population of 9 million people.

Professor Glen Mola, the head of obstetrics and gynaecology at Port Moresby General Hospital, said the government could be more vigorous in quelling misinformation from anti-vaxxers.

“It’s just ridiculous that we spend hundreds of hours out of our precious health worker time countering the ridiculous conspiracy theories of a few people. They spend all their days on social media spreading all this fear,” he said.

“The Controller has powers under the National Pandemic Act, to declare people a threat to public safety… and give them a warning and lock them up if they don’t heed the warning.”

Hesitancy, social media and antivaxxers
Many of PNG’s nurses initially refused to get the vaccine when first offered in late March and early April, asking for clear information about its safety and efficacy.

A Port Moresby nurse (who asked not to be named) this week told RNZ her colleagues had been working their way through the information about the vaccine that had since been made available to them, but she was not yet convinced about it.

“The frontliners are not well informed of all those things, so most of us are still in suspense. But we are just trying to read around and search online, and see for ourselves what it is.”

Professor Mola said his team of doctors had all lined up for the jab, but more work was needed to be put into the campaign to vaccinate as many health workers as possible.

“They’ve had their first shot, and some have had two shots now — that’s the doctors in the maternity side. And we have not had a doctor go down with covid since we started vaccinating.”

One prominent anti-vaxxer in PNG with almost 7000 Facebook followers offers multiple daily commentaries on what she described as a global project to kill and maim millions.

The information shared included “terrifying” reports from an alternative UK media source, denigration of organisations which support the vaccine rollout in PNG, and questions such as: “How many times do we have to tell these idiots who have allowed themselves to be injected with poison?”

Marape earlier warned citizens against relying on information on Facebook to guide their approach to vaccines.

The official death toll from covid-19 in PNG is 164, but as with the total confirmed cases, the real figure is likely to be much higher, as testing for the virus and reporting of deaths have been limited.

Health workers feature prominently among those in PNG confirmed to have caught the virus so far, and systemic staffing shortages were placing great strain on the workers who continued on the job.

The Port Moresby nurse spoken to by RNZ said she believed there were hospital staff infected with the virus who continued to work in the hospital.

“Maybe they are just trying to normalise the coronavirus like any other diseases,” she said.

Solomon Islands health workers warned
In Solomon Islands, Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare spoke out in a nationwide address criticising a small group of health workers who had promoted misinformation about covid-19 vaccine safety and effectiveness.

He said it was extremely sad that the group had ignored evidence that vaccines were vital to break the cycle of the pandemic, and instead promoted misleading information to the public.

“While I respect individual points of view, I will not allow deliberate misinformation to scare people that wish to protect themselves from covid-19.

“If such deliberate misinformation continues, those involved will be held accountable in accordance with provisions of the relevant regulations.”

Counting on demographics
Professor Mola said drily that the upshot was that PNG was relying on the natural protection in a youthful population to mitigate some of the impacts of covid-19.

“Seventy five percent of our population are under 30. And by and large (among) under-30s only one out of 1000 gets seriously ill, and one out of 2000 dies. So we’re going to rely on the protection of youth.”

PNG Health Minister Jelta Wong said officials were doing what they could to vaccinate the priority groups, and while there were ongoing “issues” with reaching all healthworkers, the vaccinations were now been extended to the elderly.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Papua New Guinea’s Prime Minister James Marape is appealing to people to take the covid-19 vaccine before doses expire.

This comes as the number of covid cases in PNG has climbed by around 1000 a week since February.

A little over 40,000 people in PNG have received their first dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine. Of this number, 6500 are health workers, the rest are essential workers and a small number of people with co-morbidities.

• READ MORE: PNG’s covid-19 cases still growing – 10 percent are health workers
• More articles about PNG’s covid crisis

But PNG authorities are grappling with vaccine hesitancy, and are anxious to use up tens of thousands more Astrazeneca doses before they expire.

The prime minister, who was the first in PNG to take the jab back in March, has appealed to people to take the vaccine that was made available despite a global shortage.

Marape, who took his second dose of Astrazeneca last week, has moved to dispel rumours about the vaccine, saying it was safe and represented the best opportunity for people to protect themselves against the virus.

He told local media that he had not experienced any form of side effects from the first dose and that now, with the second dose, he was on the path to acquiring 80 percent immunity against covid-19 after 40 days.

100,000 doses in storage
But even with the government’s vaccination awareness campaign, more than 100,000 doses remain in storage and in danger of going to waste.

Many of the doses, made available to PNG through the Covax facility, are due to expire in either mid or late July.

Marape said his government was doing everything possible to have the vaccine available and that if people did not get themselves vaccinated and then felt sick and maybe died, then they only had themselves to blame.

With the government opting not to make vaccination compulsory, the prime minister emphasised that it was a choice that citizens had to make.

He said PNG was lucky to have access to vaccines earlier this year, thanks to partners such as the World Health Organisation, the Covax facility and the Australian government.

Meanwhile, PNG’s Pandemic Response Controller reported 40 new covid-19 cases yesterday, increasing the country’s total cases to 16,682 while the death toll is 164.

To date, more than 126,000 people have been tested for the virus in a population of almost 9 million. All 22 provinces including the Autonomous Region of Bougainville have reported cases.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

New Zealand’s leading daily newspaper has warned the country against complacency over the covid-19 pandemic and to look to Fiji for an example of how things can easily go wrong.

In an editorial today, The New Zealand Herald has also criticised the government over its communication strategy and failure to counter a disinformation campaign threatening the national vaccination rollout.

“Complacency is our greatest enemy, particularly while the director-general of health continues to report no community transmissions in his regular briefings and with just 5 percent of the population having received a second vaccine shot,” said the Herald.

• READ MORE: Editorial: Controlling the message in times of covid 19 coronavirus
• Fiji’s government goes quiet as covid crisis spirals out of control
• Every claim by Voices of Freedom debunked by scientists

“Fiji has discovered geographical isolation is not enough to avoid the increased transmissible variants of covid. Vigilance and adherence to official advice remains crucial as the best mechanism we have to the defeating this damned thing.

“Raising our prevention and contact tracing game after it has arrived is too late.”

From early on in the covid-19 pandemic, it was obvious that consistent communication was essential for New Zealanders to maintain compliance with key measures to limit transmission of the virus, said the newspaper.

“Now we know ‘influencers’ were deployed in Auckland’s March [2020] lockdown to push messages into social media as the government fretted about online posts undermining the pandemic response,” the Herald said.

Jeopardising NZ’s response
“It appears it was thought overly harsh critics condemning infected people for not self-isolating could truly jeopardise the country’s response. A newly released Cabinet paper said ‘social licence’ was crucial to a strong covid-19 response.

“Such hostility could undermine the overall pandemic response, wrote covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins. ‘Public reaction to particular individuals who have not used the covid-19 Tracer app or otherwise failed to follow good practices suggests a possible erosion of this.’

“So, the Government sought help from social media figures who were deemed to have sway in Māori, Pacific, Indian and youth communities. Hosts from radio stations Tarana, Flava, The Edge and Hauraki subsequently posted reassuring photos and messages, using the campaign’s hashtag #stayinforit.

“Contrast this social media influencing tactic with the lack of action around countering misinformation on the vaccine.

“Most will have by now seen or heard of the leaflets put in mailboxes in a concerted campaign to raise unfounded fears about the vaccine and undermine the protection offered by mass immunity.

“The flyer was produced and distributed by a group called Voices for Freedom. Co-founder Claire Deeks ran as a candidate for Advance New Zealand at the last election, and was third on the party list.

“The group claimed to be putting out two million flyers to coincide with the government’s vaccine campaign.”

Information investigation
The Herald noted how investigative journalist David Fisher had sought any communications about what government agencies might do to address the false claims being disseminated about the vaccine and was told “the information does not exist”.

“For all its efforts and expense, Voices for Freedom failed to register as a threat.”

The government itself had not always been clear in all its communications, with some “casual contacts” of positive cases being upgraded to “casual plus” without announcement or explanation in March this year, the newspaper said.

“The Prime Minister was also accused of neglecting her own advice to ‘be kind’ when she publicly criticised a covid-infected person who continued to work at a KFC store.

“Ultimately, the government is well aware the greatest risk is the public passively drifting off the necessary precautions rather than active resistance.”

• Read the full New Zealand Herald editorial

The Timor-Leste government may apply disciplinary action to public officials doing face-to-face work who refuse to take the vaccine, while maintaining that vaccination against covid-19 is not mandatory.

Minister of the Presidency of the Council of Ministers Fidelis Magalhães admitted the government’s tough stance, explaining that the vaccine was not mandatory — but that it was required of public officials who have to work in person.

“A person who rejects the vaccine cannot be present at the workplace,” he said.

• READ MORE: Other Timor-Leste pandemic reports

“If you are a civil servant who refuses and cannot be present when you are asked to be present, this is disobedience through failure to fulfill your duty,” the official told Lusa.

“There is disciplinary action for not going to work, for not showing up at work, in accordance with the law and the regulations,” he said.

A government resolution of May 19 – which aims to intensify the vaccination rollout in the country – already determines that employees in face-to-face work must have partial or complete vaccination.

This text defines “partial or complete vaccination as a relevant criterion to be adopted by the public administration in determining the employees, agents and workers in the provision of face-to-face work”.

The same text – which sets a target of 5000 daily inoculations – also guides all government departments “towards approving the rules and procedures necessary to ensure compliance with the covid-19 preventive measures in force, in the internal functioning of services and in public service”.

Vaccine not mandatory
In no case, however, is the vaccine mandatory or if any sanctions are determined for refusing to take it.

“It is a delicate situation between mandatory vaccination and the need to increase the number of people vaccinated,” Magalhães said.

“The government is the highest body of public administration. As the highest body, it has a duty to guarantee the safety of its own employees — and the maximum safety is that workers are not infected with the virus.”

Tatoli News reports that Timor-Leste health authorities registered 231 covid-19 cases yesterday, 215 in Dili, and 16 in other municipalities. Officials said 158 people had recovered.

Antonio Sampaio is the bureau chief of Lusa News Agency in Dili. This article is republished with permission.

An international panel co-chaired by former prime minister Helen Clark is calling for urgent reform of the world’s pandemic preparedness.

In its review, the Independent Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response identified a systematic failing to protect people from covid-19 – on both national and international levels.

New Zealand was named as one of the countries ordering up large on covid-19 in a section warning of “vaccine nationalism”, in which some richer countries had secured more vaccine courses than they had people.

• LISTEN TO RNZ MORNING REPORT: ‘We’re not in mediaeval times where a dangerous virus goes along by donkey and foot” – Helen Clark (duration 7′:27″)
• READ MORE: Covid-19: Serious failures in WHO and global response, report finds

But the report also said New Zealand and other Asia-Pacific countries had an aggressive response to combating the virus, and lessons could be learned from them.

The panel recommended essential measures it believed would mitigate future pandemics.

Clark told RNZ Morning Report there were failures, gaps and delays all along the way from the time the virus first appeared in Wuhan.

“The doctors were reasonably on the ball there in noticing the cluster and getting the tests done and there was a public bulletin put out in Wuhan … but let’s recall Wuhan didn’t lock down at all for another 23 days after that.

‘Not in medieval times’
“We’re not in medieval times where a dangerous virus goes along by donkey and foot, we’re in times where it goes on the next plane, so any delay is fatal.

“Then the WHO – which doesn’t really have the power to require or enforce anything – was quite constrained by the regulations it operates in and when eventually an emergency committee which is supposed to make recommendations about the big declaration of an emergency, when it was first convened it refused to make a recommendation … even if all of that had been quicker the reality is the slow month of February when few countries did much other than wait and watch, that was the opportunity lost to avert what has become a runaway pandemic.”

The truth of it was that China was slow to share information and what it did share was limited.

“The case information was limited, the genome took up to a week to share after it was sequenced, and so we go on. The WHO had no power to require anything. People may not realise the WHO does not have any power to say ‘we’re coming to look’.

It doesn’t have the power to publish the information a country gives it without permission. It’s quite restricted in being precautionary because the international health regulations require evidence … and then it has to convene this emergency committee to hear their recommendations, and when it convened, it did not want to act.

“This is all a bit hopeless really.”

Clark said the issue was going to be “are the lessons of history learned and these issues addressed or are we doomed to repeat them again? We can’t count on waiting 102 years again like we have from the flu pandemic for the next pathogen.

“We are living in times when zoonotic diseases – these transferred from animal to human viruses – are appearing much more rapidly. It could be next month, it could be next year. We can’t mess around in getting the new system and the new powers in place.”

Vaccine nationalism
Clark said: “What I think has happened is what when countries like ours prudently started placing orders they didn’t know which vaccine was going to come out trumps. So … the ones it ordered … have all come through as legitimate and viable vaccines.

“So here we are with all these courses and we can’t use them all. We are using the Pfizer one. So our message to countries like our own is put them back into the pool. We have a huge supply problem with the vaccine. There is nowhere near enough vaccine to do the job that needs to be done globally,” she said.

“If we can redistribute that which is not going to be used by the high-income countries now, that certainly helps to cover the most at risk and health workers and so on in poorer countries.

“Then we talk a lot in the report about the need to scale up production. The manufacturers have kept it pretty close to their chest. You need a huge scale-up around the world to get the level of supply that we need … to do this on an ongoing basis globally requires a vast manufacturing scale-up from what we have right now.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

A covid-19 vaccine from French company Valneva has yet to complete clinical trials. But it has caught the eye of governments in the UK, Europe and Australia.

One of the vaccine’s main selling points is its apparent ability to mount a more general immune response against SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes covid-19, rather than rely on the spike protein to do this.

This means the vaccine is more likely to be effective against the type of virus variants that have already been emerging, and may emerge in the future. Some reports describe it as “variant proof”.

• READ MORE: From adenoviruses to RNA: the pros and cons of different covid vaccine technologies
  
• UK, South African, Brazilian: a virologist explains each covid variant and what they mean for the pandemic
• A single vaccine to beat all coronaviruses sounds impossible. But scientists are already working on one

The hope is vaccines using this technology would be able to provide protection for longer, rather than keep being reformulated to get ahead of these new variants.

How does Valneva work?
Valneva’s vaccine, called VLA2001, is based on tried and tested vaccine technology. It is the technology used in the vaccine against poliovirus and in some types of flu vaccines. And the company already has a commercially available Japanese encephalitis vaccine based on the same technology.

VLA2001 uses an inactivated version of the whole virus, which cannot replicate or cause disease.

The virus is inactivated using a chemical called beta-propiolactone or BPL. This is widely used to inactivate other viruses for vaccines. It was even used to make experimental versions of vaccines against SARS-CoV, the virus that caused SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome).

This type of inactivation is expected to preserve the structure of the viral proteins, as they would occur in nature. This means the immune system will be presented with something similar to what occurs naturally, and mount a strong immune response.

After being inactivated, the vaccine would be highly purified. Then, an adjuvant (an immune stimulant) is added to induce a strong immune response.

VLA2001 isn’t the first inactivated vaccine against covid-19. Leading covid-19 inactivated vaccines, such as those developed by Sinopharm and Bharat Biotech, have been approved for use in China and received emergency approval in other countries, including India.

However, VLA2001 is the only covid-19 vaccine candidate using whole inactivated virus in clinical trials in the UK and in mainland Europe.

What are the benefits known so far?
This approach to vaccine development presents the immune system with all of the structural components of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, not just the spike protein, as many other covid-19 vaccines do.

So Valneva’s vaccine is thought to produce a more broadly protective immune response. That is, antibodies and cells of the immune system are able to recognise and neutralise more pieces of the virus than just the spike protein.

The federal government is speaking with a French company about potentially importing its vaccine to use in the Australian rollout.https://t.co/8OXapOauE4

— news.com.au (@newscomauHQ) May 1, 2021

As a result, Valneva’s vaccine could be more effective at tackling emerging covid-19 virus variants and, if approved, play a useful role as a booster vaccine.

Valneva’s vaccine can be stored at standard cold-chain conditions (2-8℃) and is expected to be given as two shots.

How about results from clinical trials?
According to the company, no safety concerns or serious adverse events were associated with VLA2001 in early-stage clinical trials.

VLA2001 was given as a low, medium or high dose in these trials with all participants in the high-dose group generating antibodies to the virus spike protein.

One measure of immune response in the high-dose group after completing the two doses indicated antibody levels were, after two weeks, at least as high as those seen in patients naturally infected with SARS-CoV-2.

Interestingly, VLA2001 induced immune responses against a number of virus proteins (including the spike protein) across all participants, an encouraging sign the vaccine can provide broad protection against covid-19.

We’re looking for volunteers for the latest UK COVID-19 vaccine study.

The Valneva phase 2/3 study is open to healthy adults who have not had a previous COVID-19 vaccine.

Sign up via the NHS Covid-19 vaccine research registry: https://t.co/san2RD5Oq6 pic.twitter.com/hyHgGeBAiL

— R&D Southampton (@RDsouthampton) May 4, 2021

The vaccine has since advanced to phase 3 clinical trials in the UK. The trial, which started in April 2021, will compare its safety and efficacy with the AstraZeneca vaccine.

The phase 3 trial is expected to be completed by the northern hemisphere’s autumn this year. And if successful, would be submitted for regulatory approval after that.

Who is interested?
Despite phase 3 clinical trials only just starting, the UK government has pre-ordered more than 100 million doses of the vaccine from Valneva, with the option of buying more down the track. If trials prove successful and pass regulatory approval, this means the vaccine could be used as a booster in time for this year’s northern hemisphere’s winter.

Australia has confirmed it’s also in talks with Valeneva about importing the vaccine. Some countries in Europe are also reportedly keen to strike a deal.

EXCLUSIVE Some EU nations still want Valneva COVID-19 vaccine deal -sources https://t.co/FtL49NU37L pic.twitter.com/g3yhFaOKuB

— Reuters World (@ReutersWorld) April 30, 2021

As new cases of covid-19 increase globally, we’ll continue to see new viral variants emerge that threaten to escape the protection existing vaccines offer.

Already, we are seeing vaccines from companies such as Moderna and Novavax begin to reformulate their spike protein-based vaccines to get ahead of emerging variants.

So Valneva’s vaccine, with the potential to elicit a more broadly protective immune response, may prove to be a useful tool to combat the rise of the virus and its mutations. However, whether the vaccine is really “variant proof” or merely less affected by emerging variants remains to be seen.

Dr Adam Taylor, is early career research leader, Emerging Viruses, Inflammation and Therapeutics Group, Menzies Health Institute Queensland, Griffith University. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

Papua New Guinea’s Prime Minister has warned citizens against relying on information on Facebook to guide their approach to vaccines.

James Marape was speaking after becoming the first person to receive the AstraZeneca covid-19 vaccine in his country.

Australia has provided an initial 8000 vaccine doses to PNG where the total number of confirmed covid-19 cases has climbed by hundreds to 5991 – a rise of 371 by midday on Tuesday.

• READ MORE: More PNG covid pandemic reports

The death toll has now reached 60.

Faced with vaccine hesitancy in PNG, Marape said citizens should be comforted by evidence in Australia and elsewhere that it is safe for populations to get vaccinated.

“Facebook is not a place where you source accurate information. Look into established literature and data available on what vaccines can do, on what is being done globally,” he said.

“For us, Papua New Guinea, we are beneficial to research already conducted elsewhere, based on best evidence available,” the prime minister explained.

Marape reassures the public
After getting the jab himself, Marape sought to assure the public, especially health workers, that the AstraZeneca covid-19 vaccine was safe.

Hundreds of health workers have been infected with covid-19, and Marape said he did not want the country to lose any frontliners.

He said community transmission of the virus was increasingly hampering the health system.

While vaccination was not compulsory, Marape said PNG’s communities must take ownership of fighting the virus.

A nation-wide isolation strategy which commenced this month introduced restrictions on public movement, as well as mandatory mask use and other measures, but adherence had been slack in many areas.

The prime minister indicated that the government could impose further measures to restrict movement of people between villages, towns and provinces,

PNG keeping options open on vaccine access
Marape said the government was looking at all options to ensure that covid-19 vaccines were optionally available for Papua New Guineans.

He told reporters his government was working closely with the Chinese government.

PNG’s medical authorities are considering whether to approve China’s Sinopharm vaccine for use in the country, with an announcement expected in the coming week.

Two months ago China announced a donation of 200-thousand doses of the vaccine to PNG.

Marape said PNG was also expecting another million Astra Zeneca doses from Australia, and is looking into other possibilities through the global Covax network.

The latest numbers from the Pandemic Response Controller
Papua New Guinea recorded four new covid-19 deaths to Tuesday midday, taking the national toll to 60.

All four deaths were reported in the National Capital District.

Two females aged 19 and 63, with the two men aged 44 and 49.

Most of the deaths, 48, have happened in Port Moresby.

The total number of cases is up to 5,991 – a rise of 371.

Again most in the capital, but also 31 in Morobe, 36 in Western Province and 8 in Bougainville.

There are now covid cases in 20 of PNG 22 provinces.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

New Zealand expects to open a two-way travel bubble with the Cook Islands in May and is planning a vaccination campaign there.

The leaders of both nations met in Auckland today, with New Zealand confirming $20 million in additional support for the country this financial year.

Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Brown is the first international leader to be officially welcomed into New Zealand since the pandemic began.

• READ MORE: Other Cook islands reports
• Cooks Prime Minister Mark Brown on RNZ Checkpoint

Speaking to media after the meeting, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the two discussed the road map for quarantine-free travel.

She said the vaccination campaign – also planned to begin in May – will pave the way.

“There has been significant work with preparedness and we are currently working in earnest towards a May commencement. The Director-General of Health has also advised that beginning vaccination will add to the safe opening of quarantine-free travel.”

Brown has said the Cook Islands’ updated contact tracing app, which is compatible with the New Zealand Covid Tracer app, is also an essential step on the path to two-way quarantine-free travel.

$20m ‘sweetener’
In the meantime, New Zealand is offering the $20 million sweetener from a “recently reprioritised” Development Assistant budget.

A one-way travel bubble between Rarotonga and New Zealand has been in place since the end of January allowing quarantine-free travel from the Cook Islands to New Zealand.

At least 300 Cook Islanders have arrived in New Zealand to look for work since the one-way travel arrangement came into effect and residents are also travelling to New Zealand for medical treatments they can’t access at home.

There is pressure for officials to move faster on a two-way travel bubble, or risk losing a significant chunk of the Cook Islands workforce to New Zealand.

Brown told Ardern about the “significant issues” facing his covid-free, but also tourist-free, country.

“For a country that is totally reliant on tourism – up to 70 percent on GDP – this has had a significant impact on our economy, to the state it’s declined 20 percent in the time New Zealand’s economy has declined by 2.9 percent of its GDP,” he said.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Australia and New Zealand – plus other key donors – need to urgently step up and provide assistance to Papuan New Guinea as a covid surge continues to grow, says the human rights watchdog Amnesty International.

Both Australia and New Zealand “continue to fail to support calls by around 100 countries”,  mainly in the global south for a temporary waiver of intellectual property rights that would enable increased production, affordability and accessibility of vaccines, Amnesty has declared in a statement.

Responding to reports that Papua New Guinean Prime Minister James Marape has declared a critical “red stage” in the country due to a current surge in covid-19 cases, Amnesty International’s Pacific researcher Kate Schuetze said: “Papua New Guinea’s health crisis has now reached the level we feared it would reach a year ago with a surge in cases.

• READ MORE: Pharmaceutical companies and rich states put lives at risk as vaccine inequality soars
• 42 groups and respected experts call on PM to back a ‘peoples’ vaccine’
• Horror scenes in PNG as covid squeezes an ill-prepared country in its lethal grasp

“A combination of an ailing health system and inadequate living conditions has created a perfect storm for covid-19 to thrive in the country’s overcrowded informal settlements.”

Schuetze said Amnesty International had received reports of inadequate amounts of personal protective equipment for health workers, and that some hospitals were full or threatening to be closed to new admissions.

“Misinformation within the community and online about the illness is also rife, with some suggesting [it] is a government conspiracy theory. This has also been fuelled by the government at times publishing inaccurate information on the number of confirmed cases.

“There is an absence of an effective public information campaign by the government to dispel the misinformation.”

Pledges of assistance
While Australia and New Zealand had made pledges of assistance to Papua New Guinea in response to the pandemic, they were “woefully inadequate”.

Australia had sent a team of medical experts tom PNG this week and had pledged monetary support, but this would not provide immediate relief.

“Basic health infrastructure is urgently needed in Papua New Guinea to help immediately on the diagnostic and treatment level, as well as for the distribution of vaccines once they are approved by the national authorities.”

Schuetze said there was little prospect of vaccines coming this month in the context of a deeply unequal global rollout.

The consequences of this meant that many poorer countries such as PNG would continue to be at the back of the queue for limited supplies of vaccines.

Background
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the Queensland government, between 30 and 50 percent of test results in Papua New Guinea have been returning a positive result in early March 2021.

As of 16 March 2021, the government had reported 26 confirmed deaths and 2269 confirmed cases. The WHO has noted that severe undertesting means these numbers were likely to be significantly underestimated/under reported and that at least two provinces had widespread community transmission.

Papua New Guinea is part of the United Nations COVAX scheme, which aims to fairly and equitably deliver vaccines to all countries.

However, COVAX has to date not been resourced enough to ensure poorer countries are getting access to vaccines. The scheme is being severely undermined by wealthy countries buying up more vaccines than they need, significantly impacting on the ability to secure vaccines for other nations.

A new anti-vaccine publication with links to the Advance New Zealand fringe political party should be ripped up and thrown in the bin, a health expert says.

From Te Puke, Dr Christine Williams discovered the magazine in her work staff room.

It had been brought in by a concerned receptionist, who found it in their letterbox at home and wanted to show their colleagues what was being circulated.

• LISTEN TO RNZ MORNING REPORT: ‘A recitation of a range of conspiracy theories’ – Professor Gorman (duration 5′:08″)
• The fight against vaccine disinformation – New Yorker
• What makes people believe in conspiracy theories?
• Auckland moves to alert level 1 at noon today

The first and special edition of a magazine claimed to tell the real story about covid-19 and vaccines.

“The danger of it to me is that it’s sitting around. Like you can find something on a Facebook site or something and you see it and it’s gone.

“Whereas this is sitting around. Lots of people can come and read it and it’s not truthful,” Dr Williams said.

The more than 40-page magazine contains conspiracy theories about vaccines, billionaire Bill Gates, herbal cures and lockdown.

Hold editors to account
Dr Williams wanted the editors held to account.

“I think it’s dangerous. [They should be] held to account I think … made to defend their views based on science, which they wouldn’t be able to do,” Dr Williams said.

Near the end is a half-page advertisement for the Advance New Zealand Party, formed in 2020 by former National MP Jami-Lee Ross.

The magazine’s website credits Advance NZ for fundraising to print the magazine and inviting members and supporters to get in touch if they want to help with mailbox drops in their area.

It says the party invited members and supporters to touch base if they wanted to help with mailbox drops in their area.

However, the website also states its editors are not members of Advance NZ or any other political party.

Advance NZ has also been promoting the magazine on its website and fundraising to print, post, and package 100,000 copies.

Contact attempts unsuccessful
Attempts by RNZ to contact Ross and Advance NZ have been unsuccessful.

The magazine has been cropping up throughout the country, including Wairarapa and Northland.

A Facebook post from Advance NZ in February states some 300 volunteers had received 60,000 copies for distribution.

Masterton resident Katy McClean discovered one in her letterbox last week.

“To me, it’s kind of scaremongering, there’s a lot of stuff in there that doesn’t seem to be very factual,” she said.

Her husband Aiden was equally unimpressed.

“If people don’t have an understanding of how to critically look at publications, they may take this information on face value,” he said.

Undermining covid efforts
“And that can really undermine the effort of everybody in order to keep covid suppressed in this country.”

In Kerikeri, Sylvie Dickson found two copies at her local takeaway.

“I didn’t know if they’d left it there for customers or if somebody had just left it there, but I saw the rubbish bin there and I thought I’ll do everyone a favour and put it in there.”

University of Auckland professor of medicine Des Gorman said anyone who received the magazine should “rip it up and throw it away”.

“In the context of encouraging free and open speech, there is a fine line, and this publication crosses that line,” he said.

“There is no merit in this publication, so my advice to people would be not to read it, and to rely upon the advice they get from their family doctor.”

Professor Gorman said if people were genuinely worried about health issues and vaccines they needed to speak with a trusted health professional.

‘Dangerous’ publications
He said publications that discouraged masks, basic public health measures and vaccinations were dangerous and should be discouraged.

“I’m not sure, if I read this 20 times, I could find any merit in this,” he said.

“I’m the last person to discourage free speech and freedom of speech but there’s a helluva big difference between an honest opinion well-held and this sort of stuff.”

Professor Gorman told RNZ Morning Report the magazine “dangerously, looks quite professionally done”.

“It has an aura of credibility around it in terms of its construct and that’s one of the many things that worries me. For the people who are vulnerable to these sorts of arguments, and those who are already vaccine hesitant, this may look like a quasi-official or even perhaps a scientifically underpinned piece of writing, which of course it isn’t,” Professor Gorman said.

The magazine gave an impression of a solid body of work – but really, it was a “recitation of a range of conspiracy theories”.

He was concerned it was targeted to disadvantaged communities in terms of healthcare or access to healthcare professionals, or those who felt the health system had not met their needs.

“This magazine violates freedom of expression because it is a litany of lies.”

The editors of the publication said they would not speak with RNZ unless it was in a live broadcast.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Fijians have been urged to register as the government’s covid-19 vaccination campaign got underway this week.

The vaccine rollout started on Wednesday following the arrival of 12,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine last weekend.

Since the vaccine requires two doses, 6000 front-line workers will get the first jabs.

• READ MORE: Mask use mandatory as PNG pandemic controller issues measures

But the government said this could not happen until people registered to get vaccinated.

With the absence of a national identification mechanism and a digital immunisation registry in Fiji, the government said the need to have a credible registration process and an internationally acceptable vaccine passport are paramount.

Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama said the vaccine alone would not stop the pandemic or the deaths associated with it.

But he said the vaccine rollout is a start in the fight against covid-19.

Frontline workers first
Since the vaccine requires two doses, Bainimarama said 6000 front-line workers would receive the first jab.

He said at least 600,000 Fijians needed to be vaccinated against covid-19.

“We have built an online registration portal that will give us the data we need to ensure a smooth nation-wide rollout.

“I urge every Fijian, it’s important that we all register so that we can roll out the vaccine on the timeline that makes it most effective.”

The government said the vaccine would not stop the pandemic or the deaths associated with it.

Bainimarama said the other important thing to realise was that many travellers would only visit countries whose population was vaccinated “so that is why the registration process is very important”.

He urged community leaders to assist the ministry and government in addressing the misinformation around the vaccine and to discourage those who are spreading the false information and support those who are vulnerable in the community.

Misinformation growing – minister
Meanwhile, Health Minister Dr Ifereimi Waqainabete said he was concerned at the increased false claims against the government’s vaccination campaign.

Waqainabete said claims the vaccine was a mark of 666 with a micro-chip placed within it were not true.

The smallest microchip is still too large to insert into an immunisation shot, he said.

Waqainabete said the vaccine also did not contain meat products as falsely claimed.

“The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are made from mRNA while the AstraZeneca from the DNA strand and contains lipids (fats) and a few other products such as sucrose (a form of sugar), salts, water for injections and amino acids.

“It does not contain any foetal cells, blood products, mercury, egg or latex stoppers, preservatives or pork products.”

Waqainabete also emphasised that it was important for all Fijians to register and get vaccinated once the vaccine procurement program commenced.

Two ways to register
There were two ways Fijians could register, he said.

“One is self-registration where they would fill an online form in the comfort of their homes.

“The second form of registration is face-to-face registration, whereby Fijians can visit designated registration centres to register and give the biometrics details at the same time.

“After registration, Fijians will be notified when to go for vaccination by a text.”

The government said the system would be able to capture both vaccine doses as and when it was carried out.

It said phase one of the vaccination rollout would include front-liners such as individual border controllers, sea and air transport, health and hotel workers and their immediate family members.

Phase two would cover vulnerable persons, including but not limited to, those with pre-existing commodity issues and Phase 3 would cover all those about 60 years of age, followed by any other person above the age of 18.

Fiji has had 66 cases of covid-19 with seven active cases in border quarantine.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

One year ago today, the World Health Organisation (WHO) declared covid-19 a pandemic, the first caused by a coronavirus.

As we enter year two of the pandemic, let’s remind ourselves of some sobering statistics. So far, there have been more than 117.4 million confirmed cases of covid-19 around the world; more than 2.6 million people have died.

A total of 221 countries and territories have been affected. Some 12 of the 14 countries and territories reporting no cases are small Pacific or Atlantic islands.

• READ MORE:  3 ways to vaccinate the world and make sure everyone benefits, rich and poor
• Coronavirus might become endemic – here’s how
• New research suggests immunity to covid is better than we first thought
• What’s the difference between mutations, variants and strains? A guide to COVID terminology
• Even with a vaccine, we need to adjust our mindset to playing the covid-19 long game

Whether the race to end the pandemic will be a sprint or a marathon remains to be seen, as does the extent of the gap between rich and poor contestants. However, as vaccines roll out across the world, it seems we are collectively just out of the starting blocks.

Here are the challenges we face over the next 12 months if we are to ever begin to reduce covid-19 to a sporadic or endemic disease.

Vaccines are like walking on the Moon
Developing safe and effective vaccines in such a short time frame was a mission as ambitious, and with as many potential pitfalls, as walking on the Moon.

Miraculously, 12 months since a pandemic was declared, eight vaccines against SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes covid-19, have been approved by at least one country.

A ninth, Novavax, is very promising. So far, more than 312 million people have been vaccinated with at least one dose.

While most high-income countries will have vaccinated their populations by early 2022, 85 poor countries will have to wait until 2023.

This implies the world won’t be back to normal travel, trade and supply chains until 2024 unless rich countries take actions — such as waiving vaccine patents, diversifying production of vaccines and supporting vaccine delivery — to help poor countries catch up.

The vaccines have been shown to be safe and effective in preventing symptomatic and severe covid-19. However, we need to continue to study the vaccines after being rolled out (conducting so-called post-implementation studies) in 2021 and beyond.

This is to determine how long protection lasts, whether we need booster doses, how well vaccines work in children and the impact of vaccines on viral transmission.

What should make us feel optimistic is that in countries that rolled out the vaccines early, such as the UK and Israel, there are signs the rate of new infections is in decline.

What are the potential barriers to overcome?
One of the most salutary lessons we have learnt in the pandemic’s first year is how dangerous it is to let covid-19 transmission go unchecked. The result is the emergence of more transmissible variants that escape our immune responses, high rates of excess mortality and a stalled economy.

Until we achieve high levels of population immunity via vaccination, in 2021 we must maintain individual and societal measures, such as masks, physical distancing, and hand hygiene; improve indoor ventilation; and strengthen outbreak responses — testing, contact tracing and isolation.

However, there are already signs of complacency and much misinformation to counter, especially for vaccine uptake. So we must continue to address both these barriers.

The outcomes of even momentary complacency are evident as global numbers of new cases once again increase after a steady two month decline. This recent uptick reflects surges in many European countries, such as Italy, and Latin American countries like Brazil and Cuba.

New infections in Papua New Guinea have also risen alarmingly in the past few weeks.

Some fundamental questions also remain unanswered. We don’t know how long either natural or vaccine-induced immunity will last. However, encouraging news from the US reveals 92-98 percent of covid-19 survivors had adequate immune protection six to eight months after infection.

In 2021, we will continue to learn more about how long natural and vaccine-induced immunity lasts.

New variants may be the greatest threat
The longer the coronavirus circulates widely, the higher the risk of more variants of concern emerging. We are aware of B.1.1.7 (the variant first detected in the UK), B.1.351 (South Africa), and P.1 (Brazil).

But other variants have been identified. These include B.1.427, which is now the dominant, more infectious, strain in California and one identified recently in New York, named B.1.526.

Variants may transmit more readily than the original Wuhan strain of the virus and may lead to more cases. Some variants may also be resistant to vaccines, as has already been demonstrated with the B.1.351 strain. We will continue to learn more about the impact of variants on disease and vaccines in 2021 and beyond.

A year from now
Given so many unknowns, how the world will be in March 2022 would be an educated guess. However, what is increasingly clear is there will be no “mission accomplished” moment. We are at a crossroads with two end games.

In the most likely scenario, rich countries will return to their new normal. Businesses and schools will reopen and internal travel will resume.

Travel corridors will be established between countries with low transmission and high vaccine coverage. This might be between Singapore and Taiwan, between Australia and Vietnam, and maybe between all four, and more countries.

In low- and middle-income countries, there may be a reduction in severe cases, freeing them to rehabilitate health services that have suffered in the past 12 months. These include maternal, newborn, and child health services, including reproductive health; tuberculosis, HIV and malaria programmes; and nutrition.

However, reviving these services will need rich countries to commit generous and sustained aid.

The second scenario, which sadly is unlikely to occur, is unprecedented global cooperation with a focus on science and solidarity to halt transmission everywhere.

This is a fragile moment in modern world history. But, in record time, we have developed effective tools to eventually control this pandemic. The path to a post-covid-19 future can perhaps now be characterised as a hurdle race but one that presents severe handicaps to the world’s poorest nations. As an international community, we have the capacity to make it a level playing field.

Dr Michael Toole is professor of international health of the Burnet Institute. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

A medical academic has warned the Papua New Guinea government to immediately bring in more than 680,000 doses of covid-19 vaccines because urban health services will collapse if the spike in cases continues.

Professor Glen Mola, who correctly predicted last July that the country should brace for a spike in cases in the ensuing months, said the priority was to “slow the epidemic” as much as possible.

He is head of obstetrics and gynaecology at the University of PNG’s School of Medicine and Health Science, and the Port Moresby General Hospital (PMGH).

• READ MORE: PNG approves AstraZeneca covid-19 vaccine
• Gary Juffa: People, covid is real … and dangerous. I know, I’m recovering

“We hope that we can slow the epidemic as much as possible,” Professor Mola said yesterday.

“But if there are too many sick people with respiratory symptoms presenting on any given day, then clearly they cannot all be just allowed to pile into the emergency department of the PMGH and the outpatients of the urban clinics.

“If there are just too many for the nurses and doctors to deal with, what are they to do?

“I want to see the vaccine here as soon as possible because the earlier we get the vaccine, the more lives (especially of older people and those with co-morbidities) will be saved.

‘Take notice of health advice’
“Everyone should start taking notice of health advice because by ignoring it, you are risking your own life and the lives of those around you – especially your seniors.”

Professor Mola told The National that the 684,000 doses of the Oxford AstraZeneca covid-19 vaccine were urgently needed in the country to protect the health system.

He said the number of doses mentioned would cover the front-line health workers and older people with co-morbidities. He suggested that some MPs might want to be in front of the queue as well to show “leadership”.

He said that with the spike, the lives of elderly citizens and those with co-morbidities were at a very high risk of succumbing to covid-19.

He called on young people to not wander around the entire day because their chances of picking up the virus and spreading it to older family members were high.

Meanwhile, the PMGH is prioritising its clinical services over the next two weeks due to the covid-19 spike.

Hospital chief executive officer Dr Paki Molumi said the action had to be taken because of the increasing number of workers testing positive.

“The main objective is to mobilise staff into areas greatly affected as a result of staff [being] quarantined and [in] isolation,” he said.

Action at a glance
Services to be affected include:

• CONSULTATION clinic will be closed, with only urgent matters to be attended to;
• ONLY emergency surgeries will be performed while elective surgeries put on hold;
• EMERGENCIES with category 1-3 and referrals will be attended at the emergency department and children’s outpatient. People are advised to go to the nearest clinic and health facility in the city; and
• GYNAECOLOGY clinic will be closed and bookings rescheduled.

The antenatal clinic, TB clinic, pharmacy, dental clinic, medical and imaging services will remain open but there will be certain limitations and strict control.

National Pandemic Response Controller David Manning said that a “lockdown was [still] an option”.

“Only after we make sure we take everything into consideration including what it will do to Port Moresby and the businesses,” he said.

“I expect all individuals, communities, businesses and organisations to adhere to the protocols.”

Asia Pacific Report publishes The National articles with permission.

New Zealand’s medicines regulator Medsafe has provisionally approved the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine against covid-19, with certain conditions placed on the company.

In its assessment of the vaccine, the regulator met with the Medicine Assessment Advisory Committee (MAAC) for six hours yesterday to receive advice and recommendations.

In a statement, Medsafe said the MAAC supported the decision.

• READ MORE: Pfizer calls on governments to avoid export restrictions disrupting covid-19 vaccine supply

However, the provisions mean the company must meet 58 conditions that are placed on it.

“Of these, 52 relate to requiring additional manufacturing data from the company, for instance as it upscales its manufacturing,” Medsafe group manager Chris James said.

“Six of the conditions relate to additional clinical information such as regular updates from clinical trials, and ensuring we receive any information on safety concerns from around the world.”

Medsafe had given Pfizer timeframes to respond on the conditions, and was keeping an open dialogue with the company, he said.

Same vaccine batch as in Australia
New Zealand’s Pzifer vaccines are coming in by air and will be from same batch as Australia’s. A batch of 450,000 doses was expected by the end of March.

The vaccines will go into nine large freezers in Auckland and Christchurch when it arrives on shore, then it will be distributed around the country using cold-chain storage, which keeps it at -70C.

Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield said it would then go into short-term storage at between 2C to 8C, where it would remain usable for up to five days.

“So the co-ordination of getting appointments and making sure we’re using the vaccine and none is going to waste is a really big effort,” he said.

After the vaccine has been administered, people will need to wait 30 minutes to mitigate any potential side effects. People will receive two doses, three-to-four weeks apart.

Asked about the effectiveness of vaccines against new strains of covid-19, Dr Bloomfield was optimistic.

“So far, certainly with the strain first identified in the UK, the results are promising. It appears to be for the vaccines for the couple of vaccines that have looked at this – that the variant first found in South Africa does have a reduced effectiveness for the vaccines. But it’s still highly effective for the ones they’ve tested,” he said.

However, he warned the situation could become more complicated over time, as more strains emerge.

“When people are immunised against the existing strains, the virus will try to find a way to get around the vaccine,” he said.

PM outlines who will get vaccine first
Speaking at Waitangi, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the vaccine was expected to arrive in the first quarter of the year, but could not put a firm date on when.

Once here, it would be “ready for use, ready for rollout”, with hotel cleaners, security guards and border workers at the airport among those at the front of the queue.

“Those most at risk of getting Covid-19 will receive the vaccine first, with the broader community accessing the vaccine from the second half of the year,” Ardern said.

“Subject to expected delivery of the first batch of the vaccine, we will start vaccinating first our border workers and the people they live with. People such as cleaners, the nurses who undertake health checks in MIQ, security staff, customs and border officials, airline staff and hotel workers will be among the first to get the vaccine.”

It has been approved for people 16 years and older, with two doses 21 days apart.

Ardern encouraged all to get vaccinated and said people could have confidence in the vaccine and the process followed by Medsafe to approve it.

“I have said 2021 is the year of the vaccine. It’s a full-year programme we have only just begun. We’re not in a race to be first, but to ensure safe and timely access to vaccines for all New Zealanders,” she said.

‘Getting vaccinated will save lives’
“Getting vaccinated will save lives, and this is the next job of the team of five million.”

Minister in charge of the Covid-19 Response Chris Hipkins said: “Following Medsafe’s approval, Ministry of Health officials will give advice to the government this week about the ‘decision to use’ the vaccine. This will essentially set out who are most suited to receive the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, such as age ranges.”

The first Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines were expected to arrive in New Zealand by the end of the first quarter, he said.

“Once vaccination of our border workers starts, we expect it to be completed within two to three weeks.”

At a media conference in the afternoon, it was announced a new government advisory group established to identify issues pertinent to vaccine administration was scheduled to meet tomorrow.

Meetings will be convened by Ministry of Health chief science adviser Ian Town. The scientists will keep ministers informed on the framework used to administer four different vaccines, including who should receive these and under what circumstances.

Provisional approval is ‘significant milestone’ – Bloomfield
Medsafe said it would continue to monitor use of the vaccine in the country including analysis of any potential side effects, which it said may include a sore arm or headaches as with other vaccines.

Medsafe group manager Chris James said a full assessment on the vaccine’s safety, effectiveness and quality – to guide the approval decision – started in November last year.

“The data was provided on a rolling basis, which streamlined the assessment process and enabled a timely approval without compromising the rigour of the review of the vaccine,” he said.

“All the data is considered and we then complete a benefit risk assessment, which allows us to balance the benefits of the vaccine against any known risks such as side effects. We have determined there may be some minor side effects such as a painful arm and headaches – these are not uncommon in other vaccines.

“We have also wanted to ensure the company can manufacture the vaccine to a high quality, and that all batches are consistent.”

Medsafe’s website includes more information on the vaccine, including the medicine data sheet and full list of ingredients. Other details specifically tailored for consumers will also be published.

New chapter in NZ response
In the statement, Dr Bloomfield said the decision brought about a new chapter in New Zealand’s response to the pandemic.

“I want to reassure New Zealanders we will also be applying the same rigour to all subsequent vaccine applications.”

In a conference in the afternoon, James said despite the data process being streamlined, it had in no way compromised assessment standards.

“We have not cut any corners in assessment,” he said.

The same process would be used with the other three vaccines.

The Oxford-AstraVeneca vaccine data had been rolling in and an application for approval had been received by Medsafe this week, James said.

The Janssen vaccine was also progressing well, with data being submitted and an application for approval expected during the second-quarter of the year, he said.

No Novavax application
No application had been received for the Novavax vaccine.

Four separate teams of assessors had been allocated to look at the vaccines.

James admitted that data received from clinical trials and reports from overseas regulatory partners didn’t confirm that any of the vaccines reduced transmission. Manufacture of the vaccines is primarily used in Belgium, Germany and the US.

While Dr Bloomfield highlighted the decision as a “significant milestone”, he warned: “There is more work to do, we are not out of the woods yet.”

“Vaccination is a key next step in our ongoing response to this virus. It’s also a good point to recognise the incredible amount of work New Zealanders have put in to support our successful response to date.”

Dr Bloomfield said as soon as authorities were confident about the vaccine’s arrival date, it would be made public.

Previously, he said he was confident that New Zealand would receive a Covid-19 vaccine by the end of March.

‘Ready to start’
“We will be ready to start vaccinating people as soon as a vaccine arrives, and at this time the first vaccine we’re expecting is Pfizer in this quarter,” he said.

Last week, Pfizer said in a statement it was on track to deliver the first doses to New Zealand in February, and committed to its agreement to supply 1.5m doses during 2021.

If delays with Pfizer’s vaccine were to occur, New Zealand had other vaccines to fall back on, Bloomfield said. New Zealand has agreements with AstraZeneca, Novavax and Janssen as well for the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine.

Australia approved the Pfizer product last week. BioNTech and Pfizer this month raised their supply goal for this year to 2 billion doses, up from a previous aim of 1.3 billion.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

After receiving two shots of the covid-19 Pfizer vaccine, former Fijian resident Usaia Masuwale believes the vaccine is safe and says Fijians need to take the shot, reports Jale Daucakacaka in Fiji’s Sunday Times.

Masuwale. who is a health worker in San Francisco, believes Fijians should not be influenced by negative reports circulating on social media.

“I was one of the first ones to take the shot and haven’t felt any side effects at all,” he said.

• READ MORE: US Pacific Islands move quickly on covid-19 vaccine outreach
• Samoa expects covid-19 vaccines to arrives next month
• New covid-19 cases in PNG take total to 833

He said covid-19 was worse than the side-effects of the vaccine and he hoped people would take it once it is available.

Permanent Secretary for Health Dr James Fong said a task force was being set up within the Health Ministry to plan how the covid-19 vaccine would be administered to Fijians.

For more on this story and other stories, grab a copy of today’s Sunday Times from your nearest outlet.

US Pacific Islands move quickly
In Majuro, Marshall Islands Journal editor Giff Johnson reports that three United States-affiliated countries in the north Pacific have launched aggressive covid-19 vaccine programmes, following receipt of thousands of doses from the US Centers for Disease Control.

On a per capita basis, the islands have higher vaccine rates than many states in the US, said the Marshall Islands Health Secretary in Majuro.

In the first 10 days since receiving a small number of doses to start, the Marshall Islands injected first vaccines to over 600 healthcare workers and front line government employees who work in sea and airports.

The US government is providing the Moderna brand covid-19 vaccines to the Marshall Islands, Federated States of Micronesia and Palau.

Reporting from The Fiji Times and RNZ under a community partnership agreement.

The National iwi chairs forum has put forward six recommendations to the New Zealand government which they say are a priority for mitigating the risk of covid-19 for Māori and general public.

It comes after a more infectious variant of covid-19 was found in managed isolation, signalling a potentially heightened risk of the virus entering the community.

The vaccination strategy did not include kaumātua and Māori as an at-risk group, but the government should be doing more to discuss vaccination strategies with Māori, the National Iwi Chairs forum said.

• READ MORE: NZ government accused of being ‘too relaxed’ over new covid strains

The forum’s Pandemic Response Group co-chair, Mike Smith, said it would be a tragedy if there was a failure after all the effort the country has put in.

“We think that these are the right responses at the right time in order to provide a greater level of safeguard for our communities,” he said.

“Kaumātua, kōroua, kuia and other Māori aged over 50 are potentially at risk of covid-19 and have not been identified as one of the high risk groups and we haven’t seen any evidence in the vaccination strategy that they’re included as an at risk group… the government should be entering discussions with Māori to bring the vaccination strategy into line with their obligations to safe guard us.”

Indigenous people are more vulnerable when it comes to contracting the virus and it spreading within the community, the forum said.

Strategy ‘falls short’
Smith said the government’s vaccination strategy fell short of its obligations to Te Tīriti o Waitangi as it did not demonstrate protection, partnership and equality.

The six recommendations included the government applying the pre-departure negative test requirement to all travellers intending to enter New Zealand as soon as possible.

It also recommended capping arrivals at 300 per day or 2100 per week, and, when the number of active cases in MIQ reached 20 to 30 cases, capping the number of entries to a lower level.

“The number of active cases in MIQ are no longer sustainable with world cases trending past 800,000 per day and no sign of slowing down, and the threat from new strains; at current levels, the number of arrivals into New Zealand are over five times higher than those for Queensland which has a similar population,” Smith said.

The forum wants the government to explore the efficacy of testing travellers to New Zealand immediately upon arrival in airports as they disembark; it also wants the vaccine roll-out to be brought forward for implementation as soon as possible and for the government to enter into discussions with Māori to bring the Vaccination Strategy in line with Te Tīriti o Waitangi.

The Pandemic Response Groups say the current vaccination strategy falls short of Ngā Tikanga o te Tīriti o Waitangi on protection, partnership, and equality, which is contradictory to the epidemic-pandemic history of Aotearoa New Zealand which shows that Māori as indigenous peoples are the most vulnerable people in the country.

Its final recommendation is calling for a halt on all plans to establish new international quarantine-free bubbles and immediately review and risk-assess existing and planned group entry arrangements.

Hipkins welcomes iwi advice
In a statement provided to RNZ, Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins said the Ministry welcomes the advice and feedback of the Iwi Pandemic Response group.

“There are a number of recommendations we have either addressed or are planning to address. In other areas, the government is still undertaking active consideration and the advice of the Iwi Pandemic Response Group will be taken into account,” he said.

“In relation to halting travel bubbles and the arrival of groups (such as RSE workers or sports teams), the Ministry of Health is confident its current stringent border processes including border testing, managed isolation and quarantine, infection prevention measures are sufficient to continue to protecting New Zealanders from the new Covid-19 variants.

“However, we are not complacent about this. We continue to review the international evidence and make adjustments as necessary. You will have seen that we recently introduced compulsory pre-departure testing and day 0/1 testing in managed isolation (in addition to the existing testing). These progressively take effect from 15th January.”

“As things currently stand, we expect to start vaccinating those most at risk from the second quarter of 2021, aiming for April.

“Regarding our national Covid-19 vaccination strategy, the strategy has a strong Treaty-based approach which prioritises engagement and health outcomes for Māori.

“This approach also acknowledges the key risks this virus represents to different segments of the population, including the need to address equity concerns in health outcomes for Māori and Pacific communities.

Independent, practical advice
“The Ministry also continues to work closely with the Immunisation Implementation Advisory Group, which has strong Māori representation and provides independent, practical advice and direction to the Ministry of Health on the planning and implementation of the Covid-19 immunisation campaign.

“As we get increasingly closer to a potential roll-out we are looking to increase engagement activities with key partners and stakeholders, and welcome further dialogue with the Iwi Pandemic Response group.

“Iwi and Māori engagement will be critical to the continued successful implementation of the Government’s Covid-19 elimination strategy, including the national vaccination programme currently being planned.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

The Northern Marianas is ready for its allocation of covid-19 vaccines from Pfizer after acquiring 10 ultra-cold freezers from South Korea.

The acquisition of the freezers came as the CNMI waits for the Pfizer vaccines to get Emergency Use Authorisation approval from the US Food and Drug Administration.

Even though the vaccines had not arrived as initially planned, the CNMI had been working on preparing and securely setting up equipment.

The plan is to have two ultra freezers on Rota and two on Tinian, while the remaining six freezers would be located on Saipan.

Meanwhile, the Northern Marianas had already received 10 vials of Bamlanivimab, a treatment for mild-to-moderate covid-19, and would receive another 10 vials soon.

Bamlanivimab is an intravenous drug which is applicable for patients who are 12 years and older and weighing at least 40 kilogrammes and who are at high risk .

The drug will only be administered to those who are covid-19 patients who are at risk of becoming worse.

A total of 1310 doses of the drug had been allocated for US territories and freely associated states.

This article is republished by the Pacific Media Centre under a partnership agreement with RNZ.

The world was ablaze with hope following the announcement last week that a vaccine developed by Pfizer and BioNTech may be more than 90% effective in preventing COVID-19.

New Zealand politicians were quick to point out 1.5 million doses had already been pre-purchased through a legally binding agreement signed in late September to buy any vaccine to emerge from the multilateral COVAX facility.

Within the week, a second potentially effective vaccine emerged from US biotech firm Moderna. Health Minister Chris Hipkins would not say if New Zealand had negotiated for this option.

• READ MORE: Moderna follows Pfizer with exciting vaccine news – how to read these dramatic developments
  
• COVID-19 vaccines could go to children first to protect the elderly

But assuming an approved vaccine is coming, attention then turns to logistics. Funding, procurement, storage and distribution all raise significant questions about values, decision-making and ethics.

We know there are multiple candidates for a covid-19 vaccine, but there will be few “winners”, as many countries have already pre-contracted substantial amounts based on calculated risk assessments of which will emerge first. Even then, the challenges will be immense.

For example, assuming the Pfizer vaccine does become available as a safe option, it must be held in “ultra-cold storage” at -70 degrees Celsius. As has been observed already, “Distributing an effective COVID-19 vaccine to the global population will likely be the greatest logistical challenge since World War II.”

UPDATE: We are proud to announce, along with @BioNTech_Group, that our mRNA-based #vaccine candidate has, at an interim analysis, demonstrated initial evidence of efficacy against #COVID19 in participants without prior evidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection.

— Pfizer Inc. (@pfizer) November 9, 2020

Who gets a vaccine first?
For New Zealand, as with all countries, the questions raised are complex: do we now spend a large amount of money to scale up a logistics, distribution and storage system for the Pfizer drug? Or should we wait for an alternative that is more effective, easier to transport and store, and possibly cheaper?

After all, the first available vaccine might not achieve the outcomes we want. But would it be fair (or feasible) to make the country wait?

Furthermore, because enough doses to treat everyone will not be available immediately, it will be necessary to prioritise recipients. What are the country’s obligations here? Do we offer the vaccination first to the oldest, or the youngest, or the most vulnerable?

National health systems will have some idea about how to go about this, but wealthy countries have never faced an immediate requirement on this scale.
An ethical framework
Answering these questions means calling simultaneously on a number of different ethical perspectives:

• an ethic of justice to assess the fairness of a decision
• an ethic of consequentialism to look at outcomes
• the ethics of obligations to see who we may have made commitments to
• an ethic of care to look at individual cases, rather than relying on abstract logic.

Only when we combine these perspectives can we begin to make sense of priorities.

The vaccine marketplace is a kind of oligopoly, with a few extremely large firms deciding which vaccines get made, when and at what price. Pharmaceutical companies are reluctant to invest in producing new vaccines for the developing world because they have little prospect of earning an attractive return.

While global organisations such as vaccine alliance GAVI have been instrumental in getting vaccines to developing countries, given the geopolitics of procurement it could be a long time before an effective COVID-19 option reaches the poorest populations.

We just announced that mRNA-1273, our COVID-19 vaccine candidate, has met its primary efficacy endpoint in the first interim analysis of the Phase 3 COVE study.
Read more: https://t.co/vYWEy8CKCv pic.twitter.com/YuLubU1tlx

— Moderna (@moderna_tx) November 16, 2020

The moral dimension
All this points to the deeper ethical issue of inequality. Many agencies, including the World Health Organisation (WHO), have demonstrated that health outcomes are related to socio-economic, ethnic and gender inequalities. COVID-19 has only made these inequalities worse.

Only last week, for example, a UK study showed 57.7 more people per 100,000 have died in the poorest areas of northern England than in the rest of the country.

This matches other research showing how the pandemic has disproportionately affected poorer families, including their being less likely to be able to work from home or adapt to home-schooling.

Limited or selective availability of a vaccine could exacerbate these problems. And while New Zealand may be in a relatively privileged position, this doesn’t mean there won’t be negative consequences for other countries.

This adds an international dimension to our national dilemma: we have a duty to protect our own citizens, but is there a way we can minimise harm to others at the same time?

Dr Barbara Allen is senior lecturer in public management, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington, and Dr Michael Macaulay is professor of public administration, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

The Post-Courier newspaper says a company, Niugini BioMed Ltd, set up just a month ago, will be be commissioned to create a new “miracle drug” that will save people in Papua New Guinea and around the world from coronavirus.

The newspaper said several ministers were not happy with the K10.2 million (US2.8 million) grant because they did not believe proper processes were followed, reports RNZ News.

But Prime Minister James Marape said the report was based on leaked national executive committee (NEC) documents and was a deliberate attempt to discredit his government.

He said the government had yet to make a decision on the grant.

Two commentaries about the controversy have been published this weekend on journalist Scott Waide’s independent blog My Land, My Country.

• READ MORE: ‘Million kina covid cure’ – K10 million awarded to company started just one month ago
• PNG leader says covid-19 esearch grant not yet decided

View 1: Explaining the process of drug development
By Barbara Angoro, a PNG doctoral student in Auckland

Reading the news on covid-19 drug production in Papua New Guinea has prompted me to do my take on it. Those who are familiar with drug research and development will agree with that screening for possible drug leads is just the start to call it a drug, there has to be research done and data available on the pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic profile of the drug.

Drug screening is the most basic step
Based on what I read in the Post-Courier, I get the impression that the academics have done simulations using existing drug molecules that are likely to have some drug activity against covid-19.

In a drug development timeline, this is the most basic step – you screen a whole heap of possible molecules and come up with a few potential candidates. After this step, the real drug development research happens in the lab:

Is it safe? What’s the mechanism of its actions? How is it absorbed, broken down, distributed in the body, excreted ? What is the best dosage to give? What are the side effects?

How does it work in different groups of people? If there are existing treatment, does this one do better? How do you dispense this drug – through the mouth, injection etc?

Drug development is a lengthy process
After these parameters are determined, it leads to next stages that involve clinical research and finally a review done by regulatory authorities to get approval to be used as a “drug”.

These steps can take up to 10 years, and one must have an equipped and accredited laboratory in order for the developed drug to be recognised. Because of the pandemic situation, teams around the world are fast tracking processes to find a possible vaccine for covid-19.

Covid-19, being a virus, makes it hard to find a drug cure – it is always several steps ahead, mutating and changing.

Not only that, but unlike bacteria which have their own machinery to survive, viruses tend to use the host machinery (body) to replicate.

Scientists around the world stick to vaccine development
Development of a drug that will target only the virus without causing toxicity to the human host has proved difficult. Hence, many scientists worldwide are sticking to vaccine and not drug development.

While I believe in PNG taking lead in drug research and development, I strongly feel that taking an approach that involves building the necessary infrastructure first, getting accreditation and looking at developing drugs that will target common illnesses seen in our country would be the way to go.

A well thought out plan with solid financial backing would do – not a novelty concept for covid-19 which quite frankly, based on past virus outbreaks, could quickly resolve just like it appeared, making this endeavor come to nothing.

This is my personal view as a PNG citizen (with a pharmaceutical science and pharmacology background) and does not represent that of any organisation that I am associated with.

View 2: Other priorities outweigh giving K10 million to a start-up
By Deborah Ruth Telek

We cannot even get National Agriculture and Quarantine Inspection Authority (NAQIA) accredited laboratories up and running around Papua New Guinea for various lab testing our requirements.

These labs are used for testing water supply samples and processed food samples for public safety. But we want to leap frog over all the other things this country needs and do drug research.

Wow!

The National Institute of Standards and Industrial Technology (NISIT) is failing and cannot handle the local calibration of weights, thermometers and other standard measurement equipment so it needs to be outsourced or referred to the private sector.

It seems we have forgotten about the necessity of this associated enabling environment and are considering paying a start up entity for drug research.

Shocking!

Let’s say goodbye to our tax money! I mean, the government has just restructured an existing loan with the Bank of the South Pacific (BSP) and given us some breathing space so that K10.2 million is possibly just loose change that fell out of the Prfime Minister’s pocket while he was listening to their spiel.

I wonder if the EMTV news item, about Niugini Biomed justifying themselves, is reminiscent of how they presented to Prime Minister Marape?

Imagine if they were rambling like that in front of the PM too? Would he still buy it, hook line and sinker, with that poor presentation?

Right thinking Papua New Guineans would say NO to the Biomed proposal in its current form and at this time.

We have other pressing priorities!

Articles from Papua New Guinea journalist Scott Waide’s blog My Land, My Country are republished by the Pacific Media Centre with permission.

A mad race to produce a vaccine against covid-19 has begun with the world’s superpowers leading the pack. At stake are millions of lives and billions of dollars.

Among the frontrunners is the United States with its futuristic-sounding Operation Warp Speed. Europe and China also have their own leading candidate vaccines.

As the race heats up, cheering and waiting on the sidelines for the crumbs are the less developed Asian, Asia-Pacific, African and South American countries, where most of the clinical trials for the vaccines will be or are being conducted already.

READ MORE: PNG bans covid ‘vaccination – orders probe into Chinese worker claim

Normally, it takes at least four years to develop a vaccine before it is marketed. But in the covid-19 age, health experts are optimistically predicting a vaccine in one year or less.

There is a sense of urgency and we hope for an early breakthrough.

Meanwhile, at the head of the line waiting for the vaccine, expected to be ready by the end of the year, are the populations of the Western countries. They are, of course, the priority for their governments which funded the research in the first place.

Developing world as trial labs
Poor Asian countries and the rest of the developing world, unfortunately, have to wait at the end of the line. That is why some of them have agreed to be guinea pigs for the vaccine trials in the hope that they will be given preference when the vaccines are rolled out for use. Beggars cannot be choosers.

Mid-August President Rodrigo Duterte committed the Philippines to participate in the phase 3 trials of Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine. Joining the Philippines in the clinical trials are Saudi Arabia and the UAE. However, the Philippine President’s rash acceptance of the Russian offer of clinical trials in the country might be a catastrophic mistake because the Russian project is suspect.

Indonesia has started a late-stage human trial of a Chinese-made covid-19 vaccine that will involve as many as 1,620 patients. No less than the Indonesian President Joko Widodo launched the trial at a ceremony in Bandung, West Java, in mid-August.

The Indonesian decision to be a clinical trial partner with China might be a better bet because China is a leader in the race to produce a vaccine.

The vaccine candidate produced by Sinovac Biotech is among the few in the world to enter phase 3 clinical trials, or large-scale testing on humans — the last step before regulatory approval. CoronaVac, is undergoing a late-stage trial in Brazil and Sinovac expects to test it in Bangladesh also.

Asia is the favourite destination of drug manufacturers for clinical trials for several reasons. Among them are medical expertise in specific therapeutic areas, availability of vast patient pools, excellent laboratories and infrastructure, comparable quality and lower costs. Another factor is comparable incidence and prevalence of Western diseases. (1)

There is likewise worldwide data acceptability. Data from clinical trials in Asia are routinely accepted by the regulatory agencies — US Food and Drug Administration (USFDA) and European Medicines Agency (EMA). Also, the costs in Asia for procedures, diagnostic tests and visits are generally 30-40 per cent lower than in the US and Europe.

Science must trump politics
As the race heats up, a word of caution is in order. Scientists must not sacrifice scientific integrity for politics but should follow the strict protocols for scientific research and production. Governments must put science over politics in the race to the vaccine.

“Scientists must not sacrifice scientific integrity for politics but should follow the strict protocols for scientific research and production.”

– Crispin Maslog

Safety and effectiveness are crucial to vaccine development. A blunder in the clinical trials caused by rushing procedures, for example, could lead to deaths that will set back research and development by many years.

As it is, there is already “vaccine hesitancy” among the public everywhere, especially among the uninformed. Polls show that US citizens have become less confident about the safety of vaccines.

Polling by the opinion and data company YouGov in May found 55 percent of US adults saying that they would get a covid-19 vaccine. By the end of July, that figure had dropped to 41 per cent — well below the 60—70 percent experts think will be needed to achieve “herd immunity”.

There is also substantial scepticism against vaccines in other countries, according to a recent study by the Wellcome Trust. In France, less than half of people believe vaccines are safe. In Ukraine — the most sceptical country in the world — the figure is just 29 percent.

Let us not feed this vaccine hesitancy with instances of failure.

Who gets the vaccines first?
As the superpowers rush to the finish line, the rhetorical question arises: who gets the vaccines first? Rhetorical because, unless an international body intervenes, we know the poor will get it last.

Some Asian and African countries have negotiated agreements, but not most of Asia and Africa. And even for those who negotiated for agreements, there are no guarantees, and whether the amount of doses that will be obtained will be enough to cover the majority of the population.

Unless governments subsidise the vaccines partially or fully they will be unaffordable for the poor. Early reports say the Chinese vaccines will cost US$145 per shot in the open market, while those from Oxford, UK, will only cost US$4-10 because they will be subsidised.

Some countries plan to provide free vaccinations, and even pay people to be vaccinated to ensure herd immunity, about 70-90 per cent of the population.

There is hope on the horizon via COVAX, a consortium of 172 economies now being organised and “working with vaccine manufacturers to provide countries worldwide equitable access to safe and effective vaccines, once they are licensed and approved”. (2)

“It is the only global initiative that is working with governments and manufacturers to ensure that covid-19 vaccines are available worldwide to both higher-income and lower-income countries,” say the organisers in a news release. (2)

Richard Hatchett, CEO of the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, one of the organisers of COVAX, says: “In the scramble for a vaccine, countries can… come together to participate in an initiative which is built on enlightened self-interest and also equity, leaving no country behind.” (2)

This is a welcome development and we hope it succeeds. May the best developed vaccines and humanity win. No shortcuts, please.

Dr Crispin C. Maslog is a former journalist with Agence France-Presse, is an environmental activist and former science journalism professor at Silliman University and the University of the Philippines Los Baños, Philippines. He is a founding member and now chair of the board, Asian Media Information and Communication Centre, Manila. This article was produced by SciDev.Net’s Asia & Pacific desk and is republished by the Pacific Media Centre with the permission of the author.

References
1. Asia: Preferred Destination for Clinical Trials: A Frost and Sullivan White Paper.
2. COVAX News Release Geneva/Oslo, 24 August 2020

The Papua New Guinea government will not allow the use in the country of any vaccine to treat the covid-19 coronavirus which has not been approved by the World Health Organisation (WHO), an official says.

National Pandemic Response Controller David Manning issued a new order this week requiring that no covid-19 vaccination or unapproved pharmaceutical intervention should be provided to anybody in the country.

“The new measure also states that no vaccine testing or trials for the covid-19 shall occur in PNG,” he said.

• READ MORE: Al Jazeera coronavirus live updates – Covid in Brazil stabilising, says WHO

The order came into effect Thursday.

It was in response to news reports that 48 Chinese employees of a PNG-based company had been vaccinated with the SARS-COV-2 vaccine on August 10.

[Asia Pacific Reports that Asia Times named the company as the China Metallurgical Group Corporation (MCC) – which controls a major nickel mine in the country, Ramu NiCo. RNZ Pacific also reports on the “vaccine diplomacy” stir caused by the Chinese company’s action.]

Manning said they would investigate the report and whether the 48 people mentioned had been vaccinated in China before arriving.

WHO does not recognise vaccine
He said WHO did not recognise the vaccine and anyone using the vaccine would be penalised under the legislation.

He also said the Covid-19 National Control Centre would investigate the mining company in PNG.

Manning said a flight from China carrying employees of a Chinese mining company in PNG had to be cancelled because of the vaccination allegations.

He said because of the lack of information on the issue, flights from China would be stopped “in the best interest of the people as authorities investigate the allegations of vaccinations”.

Meanwhile, National Control Centre Incident Manager Dr Esorom Doani said they were working on a standard operating procedure for children who tested positive.
There are three cases.

A 10-year-old boy was confirmed with covid-19 on April 16 and a two-year-old was confirmed on August 7 both in Western.

The third was a two-year-old case tested at the Port Moresby General Hospital after the child was brought in with respiratory problems on Aug 12.

Test results positive
“The test results came back positive. But the mother did not leave any address details. So a doctor from the Port Moresby General Hospital took it upon himself to find them.

“He managed to find them at Korobosea. The mother and child will be brought in tomorrow [Friday]. The mother will also be swabbed before they are taken to the Rita Flynn Isolation Centre.

“We will also start contact tracing for the two-year-old’s family tomorrow [Friday],” he said.

The country’s covid-19 cases now stand at 361 – 198 of them are recovered cases and 163 are active.

The cases are from 11 provinces out of the 21 provinces, including the Autonomous Region of Bougainville.

Reports from The National newspaper are republished by the Pacific Media Centre with permission.

It is essential for the health of people worldwide that a yet-to-be-discovered vaccine for covid-19 coronavirus is widely available, says former New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark says.

Clark told RNZ Morning Report there is growing concern that instead of vaccine being available globally it will become the monopoly of a very few wealthy countries and companies.

She has added her name to a letter from more than 140 prominent world leaders to health ministers at the World Health Assembly which is due to meet next week.

READ MORE: – Al Jazeera coronavirus live updates – Global death toll passes 300,000

LISTEN: Helen Clark speaks on RNZ Morning Report

News agencies have reported that France said yesterday that the world’s nations would have equal access to any novel coronavirus vaccine developed by pharmaceuticals giant Sanofi, a day after the company’s chief executive suggested that Americans would likely be the first in line.

“A vaccine against covid-19 should be a public good for the world,” French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe said, adding that “equal access of all” was “non-negotiable”.

He was speaking after CEO Paul Hudson told Bloomberg News: “The US government has the right to the largest preorder because it’s invested in taking the risk.”

Hudson apologised today, saying it was vital that any coronavirus vaccine reach all regions.

‘Operation Warp Speed’
Al Jazeera reports today that the United States government plans to stockpile hundreds of millions of doses of vaccines that are under development to combat the novel coronavirus with a goal of having one or more vaccines ready to deploy by the end of the year as part of “Operation Warp Speed”, according to administration officials.

“We think we’re going to have a vaccine in the pretty near future,” President Donald Trump told a news conference.

Clark said the concept of a “people’s vaccine” is so that everyone everywhere will be able to access it free of charge.

“Why is this so important? Because the world’s leading virologists are telling us that without a vaccine we’ll never live normally again so there is such a compelling public health reason for getting this out to everyone everywhere.”

She wanted the profit principle for any vaccine eliminated and a wonderful precedent had been set by the inventor of the polio vaccine who said he never wanted a cent out of it.

A lot of countries were already funding development of the vaccines and with public money, such as the billions promised during an European Union virtual conference managed from Brussels recently, the intellectual property comes into the public domain, Clark said.

A global agreement was needed so that the health workforce and the vulnerable, including the elderly, would access the vaccine first.

“Ideally you would establish a mandatory patent pool under the leadership of WHO … governments of course can issue compulsory licences for the manufacture of drugs where there’s a compelling public health reason … there will need to be money mobilised from donors.

“…But basically this needs to be manufactured at scale so that it can be available at very low cost to everyone everywhere.”

She said there was a chance of achieving this because of a “nobody is safe till everyone is safe” attitude.

New Zealand had been very successful in containing the effects of Covid-19 but would now have to sit tight in its bubble until the rest of the world catches up.

• This article is republished by the Pacific Media Centre under a partnership agreement with RNZ.
• If you have symptoms of the coronavirus, call the NZ Covid-19 Healthline on 0800 358 5453 (+64 9 358 5453 for international SIMs) or call your GP – don’t show up at a medical centre.
• Follow RNZ’s coronavirus newsfeed

Papua New Guinea’s mayhem in the Southern Highlands capital of Mendi earlier this month caused destruction of 42,000 vaccine innoculations meant for children aged under 5.

The innoculations were ruined when the Air Niugini Dash 8 aircraft was set alight at Mendi airport.

A disgusted Emergency Controller of the Emergency Disaster Restoration Team, Dr Bill Hamblin, said the rampage also saw supplies stored in two warehouse in Mendi looted.

“Not only were supplies stolen up there and resold on the streets, but the plane that was destroyed was carrying vaccines for under 5-year-old children – 42,000 vaccines destroyed,” he said.

“Now we have no replacement for those in the country where UNICEF is trying to replace those at the moment.

“The people who do those sorts of acts don’t belong in our society, they belong behind bars,” Dr Hamblin said.

“I’ m looking forward to the arrest of those people and that they get to see the full force of the law.”

He thanked all development partners and countries in the region which supported the Emergency Disaster Restoration Team.

“We wholeheartedly thank them for the support they’ve put in, without them, the scale of disaster would have been much worse, people could have died needlessly,” Dr Hamblin added.

Sally Pokiton is a reporter for Loop PNG.