SEOUL: South Korea on Thursday received its first supply of Pfizer’s antiviral COVID-19 pills to treat patients with mild or moderate symptoms.
Health officials have described the Paxlovid pills as a potentially important tool to suppress hospitalizations and deaths, as the country braces for another possible surge in infections driven by the contagious omicron variant.
South Korea’s initial supply is enough to support the required five-day treatment courses for 21,000 people. Officials say another batch of pills, enough to provide the required five-day courses for 10,000 people, will come by the end of January.
Workers were seen unloading containers of the pills from a plane at Incheon International Airport. The pills will be moved to a pharmaceutical warehouse in central South Korea before being administered to patients nationwide starting Friday.
Because supplies of Paxlovid will be tight at the start amid global shortages, the pills will initially be available only to patients 65 years or older who are being treated at home or in shelters for mild or moderate symptoms.
“In clinical trials, this drug has showed it could reduce the risk of hospitalizations or deaths by 88 percent, so we are hoping for a similar level of (real world) effectiveness,” said Lim Sook-young, a senior official in the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency.
South Korea’s Ministry of Food and Drug Safety is also reviewing whether to grant an emergency use authorization for Merck’s antiviral COVID-19 pills, Molnupiravir.
South Korea grappled in recent months with a devastating delta-driven surge that caused a spike in hospitalizations and deaths, but transmissions have slowed after officials imposed the country’s strictest-ever virus restrictions in mid-December. The rules include a ban on private social gatherings of five or more people nationwide and a requirement that restaurants, coffee shops, gyms and karaoke venues close by 9 p.m.
But officials say the virus could regain speed in the coming weeks due to the spread of the omicron variant, which is likely to become the country’s dominant strain by the end of this month. Son Youngrae, a senior Health Ministry official, said around 12 percent of infections confirmed last week were of the omicron strain, which he said could account for more than 50 percent of cases within one or two weeks.
Experts say omicron, which has already become dominant in many countries, spreads more easily than other coronavirus strains. It also more easily infects those who have been vaccinated or had previously been infected by prior versions of the virus. However, early studies show omicron is less likely to cause severe illness than the delta variant, and that vaccination and booster shots still offer strong protection from serious illness, hospitalization and death.
The KDCA reported 4,167 new cases of the virus on Thursday, including a record 391 cases linked to international passengers. Officials say nearly 90 percent of cases linked to international passengers were omicron cases.
South Korea gets first supply of Pfizer’s COVID-19 pills
https://arab.news/44kza
South Korea gets first supply of Pfizer’s COVID-19 pills
- Health officials have described the Paxlovid pills as a potentially important tool to suppress hospitalizations and deaths
Backlash as Australia kills dingoes after backpacker death
- The euthanization program has stirred debate about how to manage the local population of dingoes
- Wildlife experts said killing the animals was the wrong response and may threaten the island’s dingo population
SYDNEY: Australian authorities have sparked a backlash by killing a group of dingoes linked to the death of a young Canadian woman on an island in the country’s east.
The Queensland government said six animals were put down after 19-year-old backpacker Piper James’s body was found on January 19 at a beach on the World Heritage-listed island of K’gari.
The euthanization program has stirred debate about how to manage the local population of dingoes, a sandy-colored canine believed to have first arrived in Australia 4,000 to 5,000 years ago.
An autopsy conducted on James’ body found evidence “consistent with drowning” but also detected injuries corresponding to dingo bites.
“Pre-mortem dingo bite marks are not likely to have caused immediate death,” said a spokesperson for the Coroners Court of Queensland.
The coroner’s investigation into the cause of death was expected to take several weeks.
In response, the Queensland government said a pack of 10 dingoes involved would be euthanized after rangers had observed some “aggressive behavior.”
Six of the dingoes had already been euthanized, the state’s environment minister, Andrew Powell, told reporters Sunday.
“Obviously, the operation will continue,” he said.
The traditional owners of K’gari, the Butchulla people, said the state’s failure to consult with them before euthanizing the dingoes — or wongari in their language — was “unexpected and disappointing.”
“Once again, it feels as though economic priorities are being placed above the voices of the people and traditional owners, which is frustrating and difficult to accept,” the Butchulla Aboriginal Corporation said in a statement to Australian media this week.
‘You are food’
Wildlife experts said killing the animals was the wrong response and may threaten the island’s dingo population, estimated at just 70-200 animals.
Given their small numbers, killing a pack of 10 animals would harm the population’s genetic diversity, said Mathew Crowther, professor of quantitative conservation biology at the University of Sydney.
“There’s no moral from the dingoes’ point of view. They’re just being wild animals, doing wild things,” Crowther said.
Dingoes tend to lose their fear of people as they interact with tourists, some of whom defy advice against feeding the animals.
“That’s the worst thing you can do to a wild animal,” Crowther said.
“They just relate humans to food, and if you don’t give them food, well, you are food — that’s basically how it is.”
Dingoes are wild, predatory animals and need to be treated with respect, said Bill Bateman, associate professor in the school of molecular and life sciences at Curtin University.
The canines are more likely to attack children or people who are alone, and may be triggered when people turn their backs or run, he said.
“These are important animals, and therefore we need to change the way we deal with them, otherwise we’re just going to keep reacting to these attacks and driving the population of dingoes down,” Bateman said.
Wildlife managers, rangers, Indigenous people and tourism operators need to work together so that humans and dingoes can coexist on the island, he said.
Todd James, the father of Piper, has described on social media how his family’s hearts were “shattered” by her death.
News of the dingoes’ euthanization was “heart-wrenching,” he told Australian media, adding however that he recognized it may be necessary for safety because of the pack’s behavior.
