Category: Medical &Health

Vaccine maker Novavax said Monday its COVID-19 shot was highly effective against the disease and also protected against variants in a large study in the U.S. and Mexico, potentially offering the world yet another weapon against the virus at a time when developing countries are desperate for doses.

The two-shot vaccine was about 90% effective overall, and preliminary data showed it was safe, the American company said. That would put the vaccine about on par with Pfizer’s and Moderna’s.

While demand for COVID-19 shots in the U.S. has dropped off dramatically and the country has more than enough doses to go around, the need for more vaccines around the world remains critical. The Novavax vaccine, which is easy to store and transport, is expected to play an important role in boosting supplies in poor parts of the world.

That help is still months away, however. The company, which has been plagued by raw-material shortages that have hampered production, said it plans to seek authorization for the shots in the U.S., Europe and elsewhere by the end of September and will be able to produce up to 100 million doses a month by then.

“Many of our first doses will go to … low- and middle-income countries, and that was the goal to begin with,” Novavax CEO Stanley Erck said.

While more than half of the U.S. population has had at least one vaccine dose, less than 1% of people in the developing world have had one shot, according to a data collection effort run in part by the University of Oxford.

The Novavax shot stands to become the fifth Western-developed COVID-19 vaccine to win clearance. The Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson vaccines are already authorized for use in the U.S. and Europe. Europe also uses AstraZeneca’s formula.

Novavax’s study involved nearly 30,000 people ages 18 and up. Two-thirds received two doses of the vaccine, three weeks apart, and the rest got dummy shots. Nearly half the volunteers were Black, Hispanic, Asian American or Native American, and 6% of participants were in Mexico. Altogether, 37% had health problems that made them high risk, and 13% were 65 or older.

There were 77 cases of COVID-19 — 14 in the group that got the vaccine, the rest in volunteers who received the dummy shots. None in the vaccine group had moderate or severe disease, compared with 14 in the placebo group. One person in that group died.

The vaccine was similarly effective against several variants, including the one first detected in Britain that is now dominant in the U.S., and in high-risk populations, including the elderly, people with other health problems and front-line workers in hospitals and meatpacking plants.

“These consistent results provide much confidence in the use of this vaccine for the global population,” said Dr. Paul Heath, director of the Vaccine Institute at the University of London and St. George’s Hospital.

Side effects were mostly mild — tenderness and pain at the injection site. There were no reports of unusual blood clots or heart problems, Erck said.

A study underway in Britain is testing which of several vaccines, including Novavax’s, works best as a booster shot for people who received the Pfizer or AstraZeneca formula. Industry analyst Kelechi Chikere said the Novavax shot could become a “universal booster” because of its high effectiveness and mild side effects.

Novavax reported the results in a news release and plans to publish them in a medical journal, where they will be vetted by independent experts. The Gaithersburg, Maryland-based company previously released findings from smaller studies in Britain and South Africa.

COVID-19 vaccines train the body to recognize the coronavirus, especially the spike protein that coats it, and get ready to fight the virus off. The Novavax vaccine is made with lab-grown copies of that protein. That’s different from some of the other vaccines now widely used, which include genetic instructions for the body to make its own spike protein.

The Novavax vaccine can be stored in standard refrigerators, making it easier to distribute.

As for the shortages that delayed manufacturing, Erck said those were due to restrictions on shipments from other countries.

“That’s opening up,” he said, adding that Novavax now has weeks’ worth of needed materials in its factories, up from just one week.

The company has committed to supplying 110 million doses to the U.S. over the next year and a total of 1.1 billion doses to developing countries.

In May, vaccines alliance Gavi, a leader of the U.N.-backed COVAX project to supply shots to poorer countries, announced it signed an agreement to buy 350 million doses of Novavax’s formula. COVAX is facing a critical shortage of vaccines after its biggest supplier in India suspended exports until the end of the year.

Novavax has been working on developing vaccines for more than three decades but hasn’t brought one to market. Its coronavirus vaccine work is partly funded by the U.S. government.

Dr. Peter English, a vaccine expert previously with the British Medical Association, called the Novavax results “excellent news.” English said that because vaccine production is complicated, it’s crucial to have as many shots as possible.

“Any minor imperfection in the production plant can shut down the production for days or weeks,” he said in a statement. “The more different manufacturers we have producing vaccine, the more likely it is we will have availability of vaccines.”

He said it was also encouraging news that Novavax would be able to adapt its vaccine to any potentially worrying variants in the future if necessary.

Source: United News of Bangladesh

Effective and binding action is urgently required to protect the millions of children, adolescents and expectant mothers worldwide whose health is jeopardized by the informal processing of discarded electrical or electronic devices, says a global report on Tuesday.

“With mounting volumes of production and disposal, the world faces what one recent international forum described as a mounting “tsunami of e-waste”, putting lives and health at risk.” said Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General.

In the same way the world has rallied to protect the seas and their ecosystems from plastic and microplastic pollution, he said, they need to rally to protect their most valuable resource –the health of their children – from the growing threat of e-waste.

As many as 12.9 million women are working in the informal waste sector, which potentially exposes them to toxic e-waste and puts them and their unborn children at risk, according to the new ground-breaking report from the World Health Organization: Children and Digital Dumpsites.

Meanwhile more than 18 million children and adolescents, some as young as 5 years of age, are actively engaged in the informal industrial sector, of which waste processing is a sub-sector.

Children are often engaged by parents or caregivers in e-waste recycling because their small hands are more dexterous than those of adults.

Other children live, go to school and play near e-waste recycling centres where high levels of toxic chemicals, mostly lead and mercury, can damage their intellectual abilities

Children exposed to e-waste are particularly vulnerable to the toxic chemicals they contain due to their smaller size, less developed organs and rapid rate of growth and development.

They absorb more pollutants relative to their size and are less able to metabolize or eradicate toxic substances from their bodies.

Impact of e-waste on human health

Workers, aiming to recover valuable materials such as copper and gold, are at risk of exposure to over 1,000 harmful substances, including lead, mercury, nickel, brominated flame retardants and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs).

For an expectant mother, exposure to toxic e-waste can affect the health and development of her unborn child for the rest of its life.

Potential adverse health effects include negative birth outcomes, such as stillbirth and premature births, as well as low birth weight and length.

Exposure to lead from e-waste recycling activities has been associated with significantly reduced neonatal behavioural neurological assessment scores, increased rates of attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), behavioural problems, changes in child temperament, sensory integration difficulties, and reduced cognitive and language scores.

Other adverse child health impacts linked to e-waste include changes in lung function, respiratory and respiratory effects, DNA damage, impaired thyroid function and increased risk of some chronic diseases later in life, such as cancer and cardiovascular disease.

“A child who eats just one chicken egg from Agbogbloshie, a waste site in Ghana, will absorb 220 times the European Food Safety Authority daily limit for intake of chlorinated dioxins,” said Marie-Noel Brune Drisse, the lead WHO author on the report.

“Improper e-waste management is the cause. This is a rising issue that many countries do not recognize yet as a health problem. If they do not act now, its impacts will have a devastating health effect on children and lay a heavy burden on the health sector in the years to come.”

A rapidly escalating problem

E-waste volumes are surging globally.

According to the Global E-waste Statistics Partnership (GESP), they grew by 21% in the five years up to 2019, when 53.6 million metric tonnes of e-waste were generated.

For perspective, last year’s e-waste weighed as much as 350 cruise ships placed end to end to form a line 125km long.

This growth is projected to continue as the use of computers, mobile phones and other electronics continues to expand, alongside their rapid obsolescence.

Only 17.4% of e-waste produced in 2019 reached formal management or recycling facilities, according to the most recent GESP estimates, the rest was illegally dumped, overwhelmingly in low- or middle-income countries, where it is recycled by informal workers.

Appropriate collection and recycling of e-waste is key to protect the environment and reduce climate emissions. In 2019, the GESP found that the 17.4% of e-waste that was collected and appropriately recycled prevented as much as 15 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalents from being released into the environment.

Call to Action

Children and Digital Dumpsites called for effective and binding action by exporters, importers and governments to ensure environmentally sound disposal of e-waste and the health and safety of workers, their families and communities; to monitor e-waste exposure and health outcomes; to facilitate better reuse of materials; and to encourage the manufacture of more durable electronic and electrical equipment.

It also called on the health community to take action to reduce the adverse health effects from e-waste, by building health sector capacity to diagnose, monitor and prevent toxic exposure among children and women, raising awareness of the potential co-benefits of more responsible recycling, working with affected communities and advocating for better data and health research on the health risks faced by informal e-waste workers.

“Children and adolescents have the right to grow and learn in a healthy environment, and exposure to electrical and electronic waste and its many toxic components unquestionably impacts that right,” said Dr Maria Neira, Director, Department of Environment, Climate Change and Health, at the WHO.

“The health sector can play a role by providing leadership and advocacy, conducting research, influencing policy-makers, engaging communities, and reaching out to other sectors to demand that health concerns be made central to e-waste policies.”

A significant proportion of e-waste produced every year is exported from high-income countries to low- and middle-income countries, where there may be a lack of regulation, or where regulation does exist, it may be poorly enforced.

Here, e-waste is dismantled, recycled and refurbished in environments where infrastructure, training and environmental and health safeguards may be non-existent or poorly adhered to.

This places e-waste workers, their families and communities in greater danger of adverse health effects from e-waste recycling.

The report was produced with the input and support of the E-Waste Coalition, a group of 10 UN agencies and international organizations, including the WHO, who have come together to increase collaboration, build partnerships and more efficiently provide support to Member States to address the e-waste challenge.

Source: United News of Bangladesh

Notwithstanding a drop in the number of fresh cases in several countries, the global Covid-19 caseload surged past 176 million on Tuesday.

The total Covid case count and fatalities currently stand at 176,200,581 and 3,808, 883, respectively, as per the data compiled by Johns Hopkins University (JHU).

A total of 2,371,180,270 doses of vaccine have been administered to date, according to the university.

The US, which is the world’s worst-hit country in terms of cases and deaths, has recorded 33,473,180 cases with 599,928 deaths to date.

Brazil has the world’s second-highest Covid-19 death toll, after the United States, and the third-largest caseload, following the United States and India.

So far, the South American country has registered 488,228 deaths, with a record number of 827 new cases in 24 hours till Monday morning.

A total of 39,846 new infections were detected during the period, raising the nationwide caseload to 17,452,612, Brazil’s health ministry said.

India on Monday recorded 70,421 new cases in 24 hours, pushing up the country’s Covid tally to 29,510,410, according to the federal health ministry.

Besides, 3,921 Covid patients have died since Sunday morning, taking the death toll to 374,305.

India has been recording less than one lakh cases for the past few days.

Situation in Bangladesh

Amid a desperate bid to procure vaccines for all, Bangladesh on Monday reported 54 fresh coronavirus-related deaths and 3,050 new cases in 24 hours — both record figures in a month.

The country last recorded 56 deaths on May 9 and a record 3,031 cases on April 27.

With the new numbers, the country’s total caseload and deaths stood at 8,29,972 and 13,172, respectively, the Directorate General of Health Services said on Tuesday.

Vaccination Drive

So far, four vaccines – Oxford-AstraZeneca (Covishield), Sputnik-V, Sinopharm, and Pfizer-BioNTech – have got the approval for emergency use in Bangladesh.

The country, the prime recipient of Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines, has suspended the registration for Covid-19 jabs due to vaccine shortage amid a delay in the arrival of shipments from India.

Some 42,532,526 people have so far got the second dose of this vaccine, while the number is 58,20,015 for the first one.

Bangladesh will start administering Sinopharm and Pfizer vaccine doses from June 19, Health Minister Zahid Maleque has said.

Pfizer vaccine shots will be given at four centres in Dhaka to those who have already registered, he has said.

Source: United News of Bangladesh

Rajshahi Medical College Hospital (RMCH) recorded 12 more deaths from Coronavirus infection in 24 hours until 6 am on Tuesday.

Among them, eight were Covid-19 patients while the rest four died after showing Covid-19 symptoms at the hospital, said director of the hospital Brigadier General Shamim Yeazdani.

Of the deceased, three were from Rajshahi, seven from Chapainawabganj, one each from Natore and Naogaon districts.

A total of 148 people have died of Covid-19 in Rajshahi division in the last 15 days till Tuesday morning as situation is worsening in different border districts.

Shamim Yazdani said 58 people were admitted to the Corona unit of the hospital in 24 hours till Tuesday morning.

Of them, 39 are from Rajshahi, eight from Chapainawabganj, four from Natore, five from Naogaon and two from Kushtia.

Forty-three people were discharged from the hospital after recovery during the period.

Besides, 325 people are undergoing treatment against 273 beds at the Corona unit of the hospital.

Of them, 189 are from Rajshahi, 82 from Chapainawabganj, 17 from Natore, 26 from Naogaon, four from Pabna, six from Kushtia and one from Chuadanga.

However, the hospital authorities are providing treatment after arranging additional beds, said Shamim.

As the coronavirus situation in Rajshahi kept worsening the district administration imposed a strict lockdown from 5pm on June 4 till June 17 midnight.

Source: United News of Bangladesh

Bangladesh will start administering Sinopharm and Pfizer vaccine doses from June 19, Health Minister Zahid Maleque said on Monday.

“The vaccination drive will start with the number of vaccines available,” he said.

He also expressed worries over the deterioration of the pandemic situation in many places of the country.

“The situation is deteriorating in many places. People have to be aware. Hospital services will be disrupted if covid increases more as there is a shortage of hospital beds in some places,” he said.

“We have to emphasise more on prevention than cure,” he added.

A consignment of 600,000 doses of China’s Sinopharm jabs arrived here on Sunday, nine days after the arrival of the first batch of 500,000 doses gifted by Beijing.

Bangladesh has also received 100,620 doses of the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine on June 1 .

The health minister earlier said that Pfizer vaccine shots will be given at four centres in Dhaka to those who have already registered.

Source: United News of Bangladesh

Despite a drop in the number of new cases in several countries, the global Covid-19 caseload is fast approaching the 176-million mark.

The total caseload reached 175,878,310 while the death toll climbed to 3,799,883 as of Monday morning, according to John Hopkins University (JHU).

So far, 2,342, 590,769 doses of vaccine have been administered across the globe.

The US, which has been the world worst hit country in number of cases and deaths, has logged 33,461,575 cases with 599,768 deaths.

Brazil on Sunday registered 1,129 more deaths, bringing the nationwide tally to 487,401, the health ministry said.

A total of 37,948 new infections were detected, raising the caseload to 17,412,766, the ministry said.

Brazil has the world’s second highest Covid-19 death toll, after the United States, and the third largest caseload, following the United States and India.

Besides, India’s Covid-19 tally rose to 29,439,989 on Sunday, with as many as 80,834 new cases recorded in the past 24 hours, said the health ministry.

Besides, 3,303 Covid-19 patients died in 24 hours until Saturday morning taking the death toll to 370,384.

Situation in Bangladesh

Amid the growing concern over the rapidly increasing cases and the higher transmissibility of Delta variant, Bangladesh registered 2,436 new Covid cases in 24 hours till Sunday morning.

The deadly virus also claimed 47 more lives during the period, pushing up the fatalities to 13,118, said a handout released by the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS).

The caseload reached 8,26,922 with the logging of the new cases.

Vaccination drive

Bangladesh, the prime recipient of Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines, has suspended the registration for Covid-19 jabs due to vaccine shortage amid a delay in the arrival of shipments from India.

Some 42,05,167 people got the second dose of this vaccine while the number is 58,20,015 for the first one.

Besides, the total number of people receiving their first jab of Chinese Sinopharm vaccine is 2,162.

So far, four vaccines – Oxford-AstraZeneca (Covishield), Sputnik-V, Sinopharm, and Pfizer-BioNTech – have got the approval for emergency use in Bangladesh.

Source: United News of Bangladesh

Dhallywood star Pori Moni on Monday filed a sexual assault complaint against six people, including former president of Uttara Club Ltd Nasiruddin Mahmud.

Pori Moni lodged the complaint with Savar Model Police Station, said its officer-in-charge Kazi Mainul Islam.

Earlier, Pori Moni in her verified Facebook page, uploaded a status seeking justice from Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, claiming that the six people attempted to rape and kill her.

The popular actress, whose real name is Shamsun Nahar Smriti, addressed the post to the Prime Minister, stating that she is seeking justice as a loyal citizen of the country.

“I’ve been physically assaulted and they even attempted to rape and kill me. I want justice. I’ve asked for help from so many people. However, they just listened to me and commented that they’ll ‘look into it’ while the fact is that no one has helped me yet,” Pori Moni stated in her post.

She has mentioned that she tried to contact the local police station and even IGP Benazir Ahmed, but she was yet to receive any formal help regarding her complaint.

“I haven’t found justice in the last three or four days. Where can I find justice? I’m a woman and actress, but first of all I’m a human being. I can’t remain silent over what happened to me today,” she added.

In her post, Pori Moni then addressed Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina as her “mother”, writing: “I was about 2 and a half years old when my mother died. Today, I need a mother more than anytime else. I’ve never seen you, accepting any injustice quietly. I need you; I need your help to stay alive. Please save me, mother.”

Pori Moni’s press conference

Pori Moni revealed the name and details of her assaulters via a press conference on Sunday night, at her residence in Gulshan in the capital.

The press conference took place after the actress surprised the nation through a status from her verified Facebook page on Sunday evening.

Bursting into tears at the press conference, Pori Moni described what exactly happened to her, sharing the graphic details of the incident and revealed who tried to rape her.

Sitting beside noted director Chayanika Chowdhury, Pori Moni said at the press conference that Nasir Uddin Mahmud, a businessman and currently appointed entertainment and cultural affairs secretary of Dhaka Boat Club, assaulted her at the club in Birulia, Uttara in the capital on Wednesday night.

The actress said that she went to the boat club with her costume designer Jimmy and Jimmy’s friend Omi for a professional meeting regarding a movie, where Nasir and another man offered them drinks at that time. She refused the offer stating that she was feeling unwell.

At one point, Nasir ganged up on her at the club and forced her to drink by putting the neck of a bottle into her mouth, beat her up and tried to rape her at the same time, Pori Moni said at the press briefing.

During the assault, Nasir addressed himself as a “friend” of Benazir Ahmed, Inspector General of Bangladesh Police and president of the Dhaka Boat Club.

The actress went on saying that when she was able to get out after two and a half hours, she went straight to the Banani Police Station but the officials refused to hear her words. She stated that she has also contacted Zayed Khan, general secretary of Film Artists Association, and other leaders of the film industry, however, did not get any legal or logistic support.

Nasir U Mahmud’s Facebook profile shows that he is currently the chairman of Kunj Developers, former president of Uttara Club, former district chairman of Lions Clubs International, a former footballer who played in the Dhaka first division and former elected general secretary of SM Hall of Dhaka University.

Source: United News of Bangladesh

Amid the desperate bid to procure vaccines for all, Bangladesh reported 54 Coronavirus-related deaths and 3,050 new cases in 24 hours until Sunday morning, both the highest in around a month.

The country last recorded 56 deaths on May 9 and 3031 cases on April 27.

With the new numbers, the country’s total caseload stood at 8,29,972 while death toll at 13,172, according to a handout issued by the Directorate General of Health Services.

Besides, the case positivity rate today jumped again to 14.80% from Saturday’s 12.99% while the fatality rate remained static at 1.59%, showed the DGHS handout.

New cases were detected after testing 20,602 samples during the period while the country has so far completed testing 61,95,714 samples.

However, 7,68,830 people have recovered from the infection so far, putting the recovery rate at 92.63% today.

Fourteen of the deaths recorded today were from Chattogram division while 13 deaths each from Dhaka and Rajshahi divisions.

Also, seven died in Khulna, five in Rangpur, one each in Barishal and Mymensingh divisions.

Vaccination Drive

Bangladesh, the prime recipient of Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines, has suspended the registration for Covid-19 vaccination due to jab shortage amid a delay in the arrival of shipments from India.

Some 42,532,526 people got the second dose of this vaccine while the number is 58,20,015 for the first one.

Besides, the total number of people receiving their first jab of Chinese Sinopharm vaccine is 2,162.

However, Bangladesh will start administering Sinopharm and Pfizer vaccine doses from June 19, said Health Minister Zahid Maleque today.

The health minister earlier said Pfizer vaccine shots will be given at four centres in Dhaka to those who have already registered.

So far, four vaccines – Oxford-AstraZeneca (Covishield), Sputnik-V, Sinopharm, and Pfizer-BioNTech – have got the approval for emergency use in Bangladesh.

Vaccine procurement update

Bangladesh will soon receive 10 lakh and 800 doses of AstraZeneca vaccine soon under COVAX facility, said Foreign Minister Dr AK Abdul Momen on Friday.

Bangladesh Ambassador to the US conveyed the message of this development to the Foreign Minister.

Bangladesh, earlier sought 2 million doses of AstraZeneca vaccine doses from the US for addressing Bangladesh’s immediate needs but the US is yet to reply on that particular request.

Meanwhile, the second consignment of the Sinopharm vaccine, amounting to some 600,000 doses, arrived here on Sunday afternoon as a gift from the Chinese government.

Two special flights of Bangladesh Air Force were sent to transport 6 lakh Sinopharm vaccine doses and other medical supplies from China.

Just nine days after the arrival of the first batch of 500,000 doses of gifted vaccine in Bangladesh, China announced the provision of the second batch of gift doses to Bangladesh.

Bangladesh has also received 100,620 doses of the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine on June 1.

Also, seven million doses of Oxford-AstraZeneca Covishield vaccine have already reached Bangladesh and India.

Bangladesh logs 54 Covid deaths, 3,050 new infections, both highest in nearly a month

Besides, the case positivity rate today jumped again to 14.80% from Saturday’s 12.99% while the fatality rate remained static at 1.59%, showed the DGHS handout.

New cases were detected after testing 20,602 samples during the period while the country has so far completed testing 61,95,714 samples.

However, 7,68,830 people have recovered from the infection so far, putting the recovery rate at 92.63% today.

Source: United News of Bangladesh

BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir on Monday alleged that a writ petition has been filed over the date of birth of party chairperson Khaleda Zia based on a ‘fake’ medical report only to confuse people.

“The gentleman who filed the writ is not personally aggrieved. It’s not their responsibility to decide her birthday,” he said.

Speaking at a press conference, the BNP leader said, “As there is no politics in the country now, their purpose is to confuse the nation by raising such (birthday) issues and try to divert people’s attention to a different direction from the main problems.”

Fakhrul said the writ was filed based on a fake and false report in the name of Evercare Hospital. “No such report has been made by Evercare. The date they put in the report has been done falsely. I don’t know how the court issued an order based on such a false report.”

Earlier on Sunday, the High Court sought relevant documents from the government to determine BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia’s “genuine” date of birth following a writ petition.

Fakhrul said the High Court’s such an order has manifested that the judiciary is not free as the country has been under ‘one-party rule’. “Judiciary shouldn’t have taken this issue into its account.”

He said many people in Bangladesh have one genuine date of birth and another date of birth in the certificate. “The reason is that, especially during our generation, parents could not remember the date of birth correctly nor did they maintain the diary. It can’t be an issue.”

The BNP leader said the government can announce that no one can be born on a particular date. “You’ve to think about giving birth to a child by calculation. There’s no other way.”

Fakhrul said their party standing committee members at their meeting on Saturday voiced deep concerns over the government’s move to shift all the services relating to National Identity (NID) cards from the Election Commission to the Home Ministry.

“The Election Commission is an independent body while the Home Ministry is under the government. So, the minimum possibility of free, fair and credible elections will be destroyed if the authority over the NID card is transferred to the Home Ministry,” he said.

The BNP leader said their standing committee thinks the minimum democratic space and the process of peaceful transfer of power will be ruined forever if the government’s ‘politically motivated’ decision on the NID service is implemented.

Source: United News of Bangladesh

Twelve people including five women died of Covid-19 at Rajshahi Medical College Hospital (RMCH) in 24 hours until 8 am on Monday as infections and deaths continue to soar in the frontier districts.

Among them, ten were Covid-19 patients while the rest two died after showing Covid-19 symptoms at the hospital, said director of the hospital Brigadier General Shamim Yeazdani.

Of the deceased, three were from Rajshahi, six from Chapainawabganj, two from Natore and one from Meherpur district.

A total of 137 people have died of Covid in the last 13 days till Monday morning.

Forty-four people were admitted to the Corona unit of the hospital in 24 hours till Monday morning and of them, 33 are from Rajshahi, five from Chapainawabganj, two each from Naogaon and Pabna and one each from Natore and Kushtia districts.

Twenty-six people were discharged from the hospial after recovery during the period. 307 people have been undergoing treatment at the hospital against 271 beds at the Corona unit of the hospital.

However, the hospital authorities are providing treatment after arranging additional beds, said Shamim. “Only those who need oxygen facilities are being admitted to the hospital due to shortage of beds,” he said.

As the coronavirus situation in Rajshahi kept worsening the district administration imposed a strict lockdown from 5pm on June 4 till June 17 midnight.

Source: United News of Bangladesh

New COVID-19 cases are declining across the United States, even in some states with vaccine-hesitant populations. But almost all states bucking that trend have lower-than-average vaccination rates, and experts warn that relief from the pandemic could be fleeting in regions where few people get inoculated.

Case totals nationally have declined in a week from a seven-day average of nearly 21,000 on May 29 to 14,315 on Saturday, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. For weeks, states and cities have been dropping virus restrictions and mask mandates, even indoors.

Experts said some states are seeing increased immunity because there were high rates of natural spread of the disease, which has so far killed nearly 600,000 Americans.

“We certainly are getting some population benefit from our previous cases, but we paid for it,” said Mississippi State Health Officer Dr. Thomas Dobbs. “We paid for it with deaths.”

More than 7,300 Mississippians have died in the pandemic, and the state has the sixth-highest per capita death rate.

Dobbs estimated that about 60% of the state’s residents have “some underlying immunity.”

“So we’re now sort of seeing that effect, most likely, because we have a combination of natural and vaccine-induced immunity,” Dobbs said.

Just eight states — Alabama, Arkansas, Hawaii, Missouri, Nevada, Texas, Utah and Wyoming — have seen their seven-day rolling averages for infection rates rise from two weeks earlier, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. All of them except Hawaii have recorded vaccination rates that are lower than the US average of 43% fully vaccinated, according to the U.S Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The 10 states with the fewest new cases per capita over that time frame all have fully vaccinated rates above the national average.

Medical experts said a host of factors is playing into the drop in case counts across the country, including vaccines, natural immunity from exposure to the virus, warmer weather and people spending less time indoors.

But Dr. Leana Wen, a public health professor at George Washington University, said she is concerned that the natural immunity of those who have been exposed to coronavirus may soon wane. And she’s worried that states with low vaccination rates could become hot spots.

“Just because we’re lucky in June doesn’t mean we’ll continue to be lucky come the late fall and winter,” said Wen, the former health commissioner for the city of Baltimore. “We could well have variants here that are more transmissible, more virulent and those who do not have immunity or have waning immunity could be susceptible once again.”

In Mississippi, about 835,000 people have been fully vaccinated, or 28% of the population. But despite the lagging vaccination rate, the state’s rolling average of daily new cases over the past two weeks has decreased by about 18%, according to Johns Hopkins.

Dr. Albert Ko, who chairs Department of Epidemiology of Microbial Diseases at Yale, said there is no accurate data to show what percentage of the population in “high burden” states such as Alabama or Texas have been exposed to the virus, but he said estimates have put it as high as 50%.

“I think it doesn’t deny the importance of vaccination, particularly because the levels of antibodies that you get that are induced by natural infection are lower than that of what we have for our best vaccine,” Ko said.

Ko said it is important that even those exposed to the disease get vaccinated because natural immunity does not last as long as vaccine immunity and the levels of antibodies are lower.

Wen said research strongly suggests that vaccinations provide a benefit to those who already have some antibodies due to infection.

“I think it is a fallacy that many people have that recovery means they no longer need to be vaccinated,” she said.

Source: United News of Bangladesh

Ned Beatty, the Oscar-nominated character actor who in half a century of American movies, including “Deliverance,” “Network” and “Superman,” was a booming, indelible presence in even the smallest parts, has died. He was 83.

Beatty’s manager, Deborah Miller, said Beatty died Sunday of natural causes at his home in Los Angeles surrounded by friends and loved ones.

After years in regional theater, Beatty was cast in 1972′s “Deliverance” as Bobby Trippe, the happy-go-lucky member of a male river-boating party terrorized by backwoods thugs in “Deliverance.” The scene in which Trippe is brutalized and forced to “squeal like a pig” became the most memorable in the movie and established Beatty as an actor whose name moviegoers may not have known but whose face they always recognized.

“For people like me, there’s a lot of ‘I know you! I know you! What have I seen you in?’” Beatty remarked without rancor in 1992.

Beatty received only one Oscar nomination, as supporting actor for his role as corporate executive Arthur Jensen in 1976′s “Network,” but he contributed to some of the most popular movies of his time and worked constantly, his credits including more than 150 movies and TV shows.

Beatty’s appearance in “Network,” scripted by Paddy Chayefsky an directed by Sidney Lumet, was brief but titanic. His three-minute monologue ranks among the greatest in movies. Jensen summons anchorman Howard Beale (Peter Finch) to a long, dimly lit boardroom for a come-to-Jesus about the elemental powers of media.

“You have meddled with the primal forces of nature, Mr. Beale, and I won’t have it!” Beatty shouts from across the boardroom before explaining that there is no America, no democracy. “There is only IBM and ITT and AT&T and DuPont, Dow, Union Carbide, and Exxon. Those are the nations of the world today.”

He was equally memorable as Otis, the idiot henchman of villainous Lex Luthor in the first two Christopher Reeve “Superman” movies and as the racist sheriff in “White Lightning.” Other films included “All The President’s Men,” “The Front Page,” “Nashville,” and “The Big Easy.” In a 1977 interview, he had explained why he preferred being a supporting actor.

“Stars never want to throw the audience a curveball, but my great joy is throwing curveballs,” he told The New York Times. “Being a star cuts down on your effectiveness as an actor because you become an identifiable part of a product and somewhat predictable. You have to mind your P’s and Q’s and nurture your fans. But I like to surprise the audience, to do the unexpected.”

He landed a rare leading role in the Irish film “Hear My Song” in 1991. The true story of legendary Irish tenor Josef Locke, who disappeared at the height of a brilliant career, it was well reviewed but largely unseen in the United States. Between movies, Beatty worked often in TV and theater. He had recurring roles in “Roseanne” as John Goodman’s father and as a detective on “Homicide: Life on the Street.”

On Broadway he won critical praise (and a Drama Desk Award) for his portrayal of Big Daddy in a revival of “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof,” a role he had first played as a 21-year-old in a stock company production. His more recent movies included “Toy Story 3” (as the duplicitous stuffed bear Lotso) in 2010 and the villainous tortoise mayor in “Rango.” He retired in 2013.

Ned Thomas Beatty was born in 1937 in Louisville, Ky., and raised in Lexington, where he joined the Protestant Disciples of Christ Christian Church. “It was the theater I attended as a kid,” he told The Associated Press in 1992. “It was where people got down to their truest emotions and talked about things they didn’t talk about in everyday life. … The preaching was very often theatrical.” For a time he thought of becoming a priest, but changed his mind after he was cast in a high school production of “Harvey.”

He spent 10 summers at the Barter Theater in Abingdon, Virginia, and eight years at the Arena Stage Company in Washington, D.C. At the Arena Stage, he appeared in Chekhov’s “Uncle Vanya” and starred in Arthur Miller’s “Death of a Salesman.” Then his life changed forever when he took a train to New York to audition for director John Boorman for the role of Bobby Trippe. Boorman told him the role was cast, but changed his mind after seeing Beatty audition.

Beatty, who married Sandra Johnson in 1999, had eight children from three previous marriages.

Source: United News of Bangladesh