Safety Concerns Stop Trial Of RSV Vaccine In Pregnant Women
Enrollment and vaccinations have been halted, drug maker GSK said, but it didn't clarify reasons why. In other news, researchers found almost no risk of hearing loss after covid vaccination, and data from another study suggests that diabetes diagnoses relating to covid may be a temporary problem.
Reuters:
GSK Halts Three Trials Of Respiratory Virus Vaccine In Pregnant Women
Britain's GSK said on Monday it had halted enrollment and vaccination in three trials of its experimental vaccine against the respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) in pregnant women, the latest setback in developing a vaccine for the microbe. GSK said on Feb. 18 that it had paused a late-stage trial, dubbed "GRACE," as well as two other studies, based on safety recommendations from an independent committee but did not give further details on what had prompted the recommendations. (2/28)
On research relating to covid —
CIDRAP:
Studies: No To Very Slight Risk Of Hearing Loss After COVID Vaccine
Two studies yesterday in JAMA Otolaryngology - Head & Neck Surgery explore sudden hearing loss after COVID-19 vaccination, one finding no link and the other showing a marginally higher incidence among Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine recipients. A team led by Johns Hopkins University researchers investigated 555 cases of sudden sensorineural hearing loss (SSNHL) among adults within 3 weeks of COVID-19 vaccination reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS) during the first 7 months of the US COVID vaccine rollout (Dec 14, 2020, to Jul 16, 2021). (Van Beusekom, 2/25)
Reuters:
COVID-Related Diabetes May Be Temporary
Researchers studied 594 patients who showed signs of diabetes while hospitalized for COVID-19, including 78 with no previous diagnosis of diabetes. Compared to patients with pre-existing diabetes, many of the newly diagnosed patients had less severe blood sugar issues but more serious COVID-19. Roughly a year after leaving the hospital, 40% of the newly diagnosed patients had gone back to blood sugar levels below the cutoff for diabetes, researchers reported in the Journal of Diabetes and Its Complications. "This suggests to us that newly diagnosed diabetes may be a transitory condition related to the acute stress of COVID-19 infection," study coauthor Dr. Sara Cromer of the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston said in a statement. (Lapid, 2/25)
The New York Times:
Study Finds High Rates Of Covid-Related Discrimination Against U.S. Minorities
People in the United States who belong to racial and ethnic minority groups reported experiencing Covid-related discrimination far more often than white people during the pandemic, and far more often than had been estimated, according to a new study that is one of the largest to date on the issue. The study, from the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities, a division of the National Institutes of Health, found that members of minority groups were more likely to report instances of being harassed or threatened and situations in which other people treated them as though they might be carrying the disease. People of Asian ethnicity, who have been victims of several high-profile bias crimes during the pandemic, reported the highest rates of being taunted by racist comments, insults, threats and name-calling related to Covid. (Caryn Rabin, 2/25)
On developments in treating migraines —
C-HIT.ORG:
The Migraine Breakthrough
Migraines have baffled humankind at least as far back as the ancient Egyptians, who blamed the excruciating headaches, and their often-accompanying visual auras and nausea, on the supernatural. Now, in a development doctors are calling revolutionary, an international group of neurologists has deciphered the mystery of why people get migraines and, in doing so, has determined how to greatly reduce their frequency and severity. (Frank, 2/26)
