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FDA okays Pfizer's covid vaccine after Trump threatens its chief: Vaccination begins in US on Monday
Can Pfizer's mRNA vaccine be called a vaccine. It is not a vaccine in the conventional sense. mRNA is a new technology being used in human beings for the first time. It is a code that instructs cells in the body to make the virus's distinctive 'spike' protein that serves the purpose of vaccine. That is, our own cells are made to produce the vaccine in our body. Are there any genetic issues?

WASHINGTON, Dec 12: The US will start vaccination against covid with the world's first vaccine, Pfizer-BioNTech's mRNA vaccine, on Monday, it was officially announced on Saturday. All high tech cold storage (minus 70 deg C) arrangements required by this vaccine are in place.

The UK was the first country to launch covid vaccination with the world's first vaccine, Pfizer's, last Tuesday. A few other countries have since given the emergency use authorisation (EUA) for Pfizer vaccine although it has come to light that four volunteers had developed Bell's palsy during trials.

On Monday, 145 sites in the US will have the vaccine, 425 more sites will get it on Tuesday and the last 66 sites on Wednesday, according to Gustave Perna, in-charge of distribution.

One person needs two doses with a gap of three weeks. It should start working in seven days. This is the quantum required for all the upcoming covid vaccines irrespective of the technology used, except Johnson & Johnson which needs only one jab. Pfizer's needs to be stored under minus 70 deg C and this poses a challenge for distribution.

In the first phase in the US, 3 million people will be administered the vaccine, healthcare workers and other vulnerable sections getting the top priority, although the States will take the final decision.

Trump threat to FDA chief

The FDA had on Friday night given the emergency use authorisation. The approval followed a nasty drama staged by President Donald Trump through White House Chief of Staff Merk Meadows who threatened FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn he will lose his job if the vaccine is not approved immediately. So the approval came by night, same Friday. On Thursday the expert panel had okayed it. December 10 was FDA's review date for EUA.

However, the FDA advised allergy patients to avoid the vaccine for the time being. Common side-effects are fatigue and headache.

The vaccine is claimed to be 95% effective although there is no way to prove a vaccine is effective unlike a medicine which cures a disease within a time limit. Prevention is difficult to prove except by a process of deduction and that is why it is said it takes usually a decade for a vaccine to be cleared.

The proof of the pudding is in the eating. A vaccine has to be safe (1) in the first place, which can be proved in course of time, then it should have the efficacy (2) for prevention, which is a deductive process taking a decade's time, and then, thirdly, it should prevent transmission (3).

Is Pfizer's a vaccine

Enthusiasm and excitement will not stand in for a solution to health issues like the current pandemic. Pfizer does not guarantee against transmission. It guarantees the other two - safety and efficacy up to 95%. But actual proof is success in the field over the years.

A basic question remains unanswered. Can Pfizer's mRNA vaccine be called a vaccine. It is not a vaccine in the conventional sense. In conventional method, an attenuated or deactivated virus or part thereof is injected into human beings producing immunogenicity in the body, training the body to adequately respond when the actual infection occurs.

mRNA is a new technology being used in human beings for the first time. Two more pharmas are using this tech: US' Moderna (vaccination likely to begin in the US after possible approval by FDA on December 27) and Gennova in India.

Pfizer's uses this technology, and so it is not a vaccine, it is a genetic code of instruction taken from coronavirus. It is carried to the human cells. The cells in turn produce the "vaccine" which the immune system recognises as foreign body and responds and is thereby trained. "The (mRNA) code instructs cells in the body to make the virus's distinctive 'spike' protein," which works as the vaccine, the FDA said. Obviously this triggers functional changes in human cells.

What they call as engineered transcription. Will it go awry one day and set off genetic changes? That will have catastrophic impact on the human race itself. To rule out such adverse effects, mRNA technology needs be on clinical trials for at least twenty years. It's something analogical to the GM technology of which there is no final word yet.

Pfizer did not take funds from US Operation Warp Speed programme and it has signed a deal with the US worth $2b for 100 million doses with option for 500 m more. The US also made a deal with Moderna on Friday for 100 m doses with option for 300 m more. Moderna was working with the US National Institutes of Health for the vaccine development.

Meanwhile, on Saturday the US recorded a toll of 3,309 covid deaths in the 24 hours, the highest for a day anywhere so far. The infection and death rates are alarmingly going up in the US while elsewhere the situation is easing tremendously.

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The incident has triggered a debate on social media whether the officer refused to take orders from a party leader or he was accused of any corruption, some netizens justifying the handling in either case, that Ratnakar was blocking public welfare work! It is true the Govt machinery has been the enemy Number One of the people of this country, existing for itself and for these politicians, for well over seven decades. India will never make an inch of progress - real progress, not make-believe-progress - unless and until this machinery is eliminated.

The irony lies in her illustration of her experiences in the country she has been living in for the last four years. What it really is!

ANALYSIS: There have been cases of Britons going to Switzerland to get rid of a miserable life. Now once the House of Lords also passes the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill, terminally ill Britons can call it quits with the help of a medical practitioner here itself. But the measure when comes into practice, will have very serious social consequences, it is feared. There won't be comparisons, even as tropes in Latin American folklores. The worst case scenario is of those who are not terminally ill also trying to misuse the provision to leave this world early when life with dignity is not available. But that is, in fact, a political question and not a moral imbroglio!

The CCTV footage and the video circulating on social media do not indicate any serious abnormalities in takeoff or descent, it has been confirmed. The disaster is becoming curiouser and curiouser. The flight path was not curvy. And the aircraft maintained a steady, gliding descent with its nose straight and the wings perfectly level. The pilot's distress call does not specify what prevented lift and climb-out. Here are some expert opinions. The sole purpose is to raise travellers' awareness about air travel.

Many of the victims were charred beyond recognition, making identification difficult. Three hundred nineteen body parts have been sent for DNA matching with relatives to determine the identities.

  • The Udhampur-Srinagar-Baramulla line provides Kashmir with all-weather connectivity and integrates the Valley with the rest of India.
  • The saying 'Kashmir to Kanyakumari' is now a dream come true.
  • The Chenab bridge on the line, an engineering marvel, is the world's highest railway bridge, taller than the Eiffel Tower. (Video: File)

A comment on social media on Kanimozhi's answer on the question of national language read: "Daughter of Kalaignar M. Karunanidhi. Delivered the Birthday Present to her Father!!" (Karunanidhi was born on June 3, 1924) (Today's headlines )

Trump said, "Elon is not really leaving" and will be "back and forth" to the White House because DOGE is his "baby." "I think he’s going to be doing a lot of things.”

Musk wrote: "My scheduled time as a Special Government Employee comes to an end... The @DOGE mission will only strengthen over time as it becomes a way of life throughout the government." Now on it will be on auto-pilot.

PROGNOSIS: DOGE was prematurely born to protect the country by aborting an impending socio-economic disaster which very few people could see coming.

Although its immediate job was to save American taxpayers billions by slashing waste, eliminating fraud, cutting Government bloat and ensuring utmost efficiency in administration for the good of the people. (Today's headlines )

"Coming from a system like in England, empowering," she says she never had an idea of this sort of experience... being asked to “socialise with middle-aged men” who financed the event...humiliating...

Originally from Junagadh, Gujarat, Pataudi was relocated to Etawah Lion Safari in September 2019 before being transferred to Gorakhpur Zoo in 2021. Recently it was receiving treatment for pancreatic and liver infections. After tigress Shakti died in the zoo on May 7 due to bird flu, Pataudi was shifted to Kanpur. Some birds are also reported to have died mysteriously around Gorakhpur. All zoos in UP are closed for fear of a bird flu outbreak.

Three other animals too had died - a tiger, a leopardess and a female wolf. Wolf Bhairavi died last Saturday, leopardess Mona died the Thursday before that and tiger Kesari died on March 30. Some of them had Shakti's symptoms but the cause of death has not been confirmed yet.

As tourist inflow is an indicator of normalcy returning to an erstwhile terrorist infested Valley, the Government has been trying hard to make everything travel-friendly, launching lot many projects and bringing Kashmir on the national rail map that physically completes the process of Kashmir's integration with the rest of India. And that defeats the designs of Pakistan eyeing Kashmir and simply explains a recrudescence of terrorism in J&K.

The committee headed by justice Kurian Joseph will study Centre-State relations and make proposals to ensure foolproof separation of powers.

"It's a big victory not just for Tamil Nadu but for all Indian States. DMK will continue to struggle for and win State autonomy and Federal polity," Chief Minister MK Stalin said.

Of 2.08 km in length, it features 99 spans and a 72.5-metre vertical lift span that rises up to a height of 17 metres, facilitating smooth movement of ships while ensuring seamless train services to the holy town of Rameswaram on Pamban island.

ANALYSIS: There is a lot of hue and cry around the world over Trump's tariffs. But tariff, simply put, is a tax. But unlike tax, it affects the exporting country too. Domestic prices will go up for some time. Nothing more will happen, good or bad!

What motivated Trump's newfound policy, apart from being a stunt to justify his existence in the White House, is a false realisation that increased tariff will make foreign goods prohibitive, thereby boosting local production, and create more jobs, and more prosperity will ring in! If that is true, India would have been shining by now: Producing own Rolls-Royce La Rose Noire Droptail and Scotch Whiskies! And what about coconut and palm oil by America! (Today's headlines )

PROGNOSIS: It looks a Real New Trump is emerging - courageous, balanced, powerful and disinterested. Determined to save his country from the cliff, he has done quite a few draconian things that will reduce the burden of debts of the Federal entity, like the golden handshake, stopping senseless funding, pulling out of a worthless WHO. Shutting the Education Department is another. On the other hand, running it is also not the Centre's job either (We will convincingly elaborate it in the next chapter).

In India the scene is just the opposite. Centralisation is the core agenda and identity of the ruling dispensation without which it has no existence, or in other words, it exists for that set of schemes only. A realisation of this never dawned upon any Opposition party in 2014 or any time thereafter, what to talk of being able to see it coming 70 years ago! The consequence of all this violation of basic natural law of the universe we cannot predict.

THE AMERICAN CONUNDRUM: Political venom has migrated to top echelons in the US. It was reported last year NASA has become politicised, vitiated. But NASA refuted the charge. How Boeing developed a glitch but its unmanned return was smooth. When Suni-Wilmore were stranded last June, why the return was set for February? Because that comes only after January 20! SpaceX called the shots, for itself and for Trump. Then the mission was manipulated for March for a better bargain! In between, what made Elon Musk 'predict' during campaign if Kamala Harris wins he would be in jail. In politics, it is said, "the only rule is there are no rules." Difficult times for Americans too.

The terminations are part of a large-scale exercise going on all across Fed departments and organisations to reduce wasteful Government expenditure as decided by a Trump in a mess gone berserk, and improve administrative efficiency following the whims of billionaire and his associate Elon MusK and his DOGE. It has not been shared how terminations are going to raise the efficiency bar! It looks like Trump has stolen some of the prescriptions meant for India. But the American problems are quite different.

Suddenly these colonial clerks feel this effortless, little rule will tremendously enhance security and convenience for the railway passengers manifold. More stations will be covered in the next 77 years! (Also See: New Delhi station stampede... What went wrong?)

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