If you were scared after reading yesterday's report of the research done at Boston University, said research is under investigation. You can read about that here. One thing the article just linked mentioned that concerned me is that the research was only done at biosafety level three, one level down from the most secure level. A molecular biologist at MIT explained, "This highlights the lack of oversight for research of this kind. If there is even a small chance that you might get something surprising from these experiments you would want to have been doing them offshore and at biosafety level four, not a 10-minute drive from downtown Boston."
Since I let today get away from me, forgetting that I had told The Professor that I would make bread, I'm sticking with a few quick notes today. The FDA has given the Novavax vaccine emergency use authorization as a booster given six months after the initial series. Covid cases in Beijing have quadrupled in several weeks. The numbers are small but still concerning. Ten days ago there were 49 new cases; now, 197 new cases. Some neighborhoods have been locked down with residents required to be tested frequently. Shanghai clearly thinks the pandemic is not over; the city is planning to build a 3,250-bed quarantine center on a small island near the downtown area.
The XBB Omicron subvariant has caused the number of cases in some Asian countries to double in one day. The BQ.1 and BQ.1.1 subvariants now account for 11 percent of US cases, up from three percent two weeks ago. Other subvariants are surging in Singapore, including BA.4.6, BF.7, and the aforementioned XBB. Some of these may be getting around the natural immunity from past infections, even Omicron infections. Fortunately, there is no evidence the new subvariants cause more severe disease, and Paxlovid does work on them.
The wi-fi has been going in and out here, so here's hoping I can get this post published.
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