Showing posts with label @POTUS. Show all posts
Showing posts with label @POTUS. Show all posts

Monday, August 10, 2020

Notations On Our World (Special Edition): Weekly #RandomThoughts on Our World

The Prime Minister of Lebanon has resigned as protests continue.   Hassan Diab admitted the corruption and the ineptitude in his final speech as the future of Lebanon is murky--especially as in our view Hezbollah will not go quietly.  Al Jazeera's Marwan Bishara underscored it: 


   As our team continues to assess it, we decided to feature these clips from the 2019 protests by the Revolution DJ Madi Karimeh  that is so poignant for the moment:




This is as our team has been assessing the on-going developments in India & Turkey and analyzing the latest from the Financial Times' Gideon Rachman as , "..  Narendra Modi and Recep Tayyip Erdogan have grandiose views of themselves as refounders of their own nations. In rejecting secularism, both the Indian and Turkish leaders are remaking their countries as faith-based states..."  

It has also been quite a week On the US Political Scene--We hereby present a sampling of the discourse over Social Media along with the on-going situation in Iran as COVID-19 rages and nationwide strikes continue--The National University Exams was postponed in light of the raging pandemic as we went to press: 







Monday, August 3, 2020

Notations From the Grid (Weekly Edition): Out & About in the United States On the Week That Was....

Charts: The Economic Impact of COVID-19 in the U.S. So Far

The United States suffered a 32.5% drop in Economic Growth over the course of the Quarter.   We hereby present the snapshot of economic activity courtesy the team at Visual Capitalist.  It was also quite as the US Dollar collapsed, Oil Companies reported record losses and bankruptcies in the US Oil Sector soared: 

 



This is as a furious debate continued over Social Media as exemplified below as the Election Season got under way: 



Former Vice President Biden was slated to announce his running mate--as Conservative Twitter began a campaign against one of the leading contenders, Congresswoman Karen Bass of California tagging her as "Communist Karen" for issuing a statement on the death of Fidel Castro.   Dan Boningo also sent forth a report claiming from sources close to the situation that Former Vice President Joe Biden is suffering from cognititive decline.   

As we also went to press, we received this courtesy Peter Diamandis--we have periodically featured his guidance in our Visions Platform--however this is an interesting development--and we present the full notation from his blog as COVID-19 rages on:

We’re bombarded every day with news about the latest miracle vaccine candidate: when it will be available, which vaccines have reached clinical trials, the stock market performance of the manufacturers, and so on.

But four critical questions are not adequately discussed:

  1. Can any of these vaccines be manufactured at scale?
  2. How often do people need to be vaccinated… annually? Every 6 months?
  3. Who gets the first 100 million doses? The first billion?
  4. How do we reliably distribute these doses? Can we?

Manufacturing and distributing billions of doses of a COVID-19 vaccine will be one of the biggest logistical challenges in history.

Because I’m in the midst of building a vaccine company (COVAXX), I’m thinking about these issues and closely tracking the industry on a daily basis. It’s an understatement to say that there are a lot of challenges ahead.

In this blog, I want to address the four challenges listed above, give you a quick overview of what my own company COVAXX is doing, and provide an overview of the other players. Ultimately, I’m hoping that many will succeed. We need them all.

Let’s dive in.


Want to learn more? Join me, Tony Robbins, and the co-CEOs of COVAXX THIS WEDNESDAY, August 5th for a detailed Webinar at 1pm PT / 4pm ET to learn more… Bring your friends and family: you will want to be among the first to know about this vaccine and its extraordinary potential.

Sign up HERE.

(Note: If you like this blog share it! LinkedIn | Twitter | Facebook | Read on Diamandis.com. Or send your friends and family to this link to subscribe!)


My disclosure: I’ve personally been working on COVAXX non-stop since March. 

While I normally focus on a half-dozen companies (XPRIZE, Singularity University, BOLD Capital, Abundance, FutureLoop and more), the magnitude of COVID-19 and the power of this vaccine is so compelling, that I’ve put almost everything else on hold to get this technology to the finish line…

Here are four of the roadblocks to manufacturing and distributing a safe and effective COVID-19 vaccine.

  1. Having an ability to scale -- fast!

We need 4.4 billion annual doses to vaccinate adults worldwide. That number will increase if we also have to vaccinate children. And it will increase further if more than one dose per adult is required. (Note: Most scientists believe that two doses per adult will be needed, a primary and a booster shot some weeks later.)

Meeting this challenge will likely require the combined output of several vaccine manufactures over the next 12-18 months.

Several of the top vaccine candidates, including the AstraZeneca / Oxford partnership, Moderna, and Pfizer, have committed to producing at least 100 million doses in 2020. Additionally, each company has pledged to produce at least 1 billion doses in 2021.

COVAXX has also committed to producing 100 million COVID-19 vaccine doses by early Q1 2021, and 1 billion doses by the end of next year.

But plans are not enough. Execution of these goals is essential for our collective success.

  1. Using a commercially proven manufacturing platform

One major concern is the fact that several of the leading vaccine candidates rely on manufacturing platforms that haven’t yet been commercially proven, meaning that the vaccine has only been manufactured in small doses thus far.

For example, Moderna’s and Pfizer’s mRNA-based vaccine is based on a technology platform that has never been approved for human use. We don’t know if the tech can reliably be scaled to handle hundreds of millions and eventually billions of doses in the timeframe we need.

One major advantage that COVAXX is offering the world is proven manufacturing. The same technology platform being used to manufacture our COVID-19 vaccine already produces >500 million animal vaccines per year, and has produced over 5 billion doses in total to date. It works and it’s cheap.

  1. Ensuring that distribution is reliable

Even the safest and most effective vaccine won’t work if it can’t reach patients.

One major concern is that some of today’s top vaccine candidates (specifically the mRNA vaccines) require storage in freezers at -112 degrees Fahrenheit (-80 degrees Celsius) for the vaccine to be effective and not degrade. That means using liquid nitrogen.

That may work in a factory or a warehouse.

But most clinics, doctor’s offices, and pharmacies don’t have such sophisticated storage technology.

So how do we get these vaccines to an individual patient?

Now consider the billions of people we need to reach in remote regions and emerging economies where normal refrigeration is a problem, let alone keeping vaccines at -112 degrees Fahrenheit (-80 degrees Celsius).

In our interconnected world, an outbreak anywhere is an outbreak everywhere.

Again, I’m proud that the COVAXX platform uses a “synthetic peptide technology” that only requires normal (widely available) refrigeration. UBI (COVAXX’s parent company) currently distributes synthetic peptide vaccines to millions of farmers in rural China who have no special infrastructure. We know that it works, is robust, and is easy to distribute.

  1. Distributing the vaccines in an ethical way

The truth is, this will not be a winner-takes-all model. We’ll likely need multiple vaccines from different manufacturers to meet the high demand. And for this reason, I wish all of the vaccine teams great success.

But even then, there are critical questions that we’re not sufficiently discussing in the media.

Who should get the vaccine first? Healthcare workers? The elderly? What about waiters? Are corporate executives more essential than grocery store clerks?

These are some of the questions we’ll have to answer as the first vaccines become available.

To address these questions, COVAXX was the first company (that I know of) to announce the formation of a Vaccine Advisory Working Group composed of doctors, economists, ethicists, and policymakers to help us answer these questions in an informed and ethical way.

I’m privileged to be part of such a brilliant team that’s dedicated to a singular mission: defeating COVID-19.

If you’d like to learn more and educate yourself about the industry and about COVAXX, please JOIN TONY ROBBINS & ME as we interview the Co-CEOs (Mei Mei Hu & Lou Reese) about COVAXX, the plan for manufacturing and distributing the vaccine, and much more.

LIVE Q&A will follow the webinar.

Webinar DateAugust 5th at 1pm PT / 4pm ET.

Click HERE to register for this free webinar, and we look forward to seeing you there!

Warmest wishes,

Peter

Here is a sample of several companies’ planned production of COVID-19 vaccines.

Company

# Doses (2020)

# Doses (2021)

COVAXX

100 million (Q1 2021)

~1 billion

Astrazeneca / Oxford1

>400 million

~2 billion

Inovio2

>1 million

>100 million

Moderna3

100 million

~1 billion

Novavax4

10 - 100 million

>1 billion

Pfizer5

>100 million

1.3 billion

Sanofi / GSK6

100 million

1 billion

 
Sources:

This is as The United States threatened further action against China  as noted by the Financial Times of London--and as the Attorney General of the United States was before the US House Judiciary Committee: 

Wednesday, April 1, 2020

Notations On Our World (Weekly Edition): On #LifeInTheTimeofCorona

As our World continues its' War on the COVD-19, our commitment to bringing perspective to bear remains ever so--please note the following courtesy of the team at USAFACTS:


THE ECONOMY AND COVID-19 

The COVID-19 pandemic is leading to unprecedented plans like the $2 trillion Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act (better known as the CARES Act). In addition to continuing to report new cases county by county, USAFacts has information on how the CARES Act and the Families First Coronavirus Response Act could impact many facets of American life. Let’s look at some historical government metrics to gain insight.  



CHANGES TO SICK PAY 

On March 18, Congress passed the Families First Coronavirus Response Act, which aims to expand support for families affected by COVID-19 with a variety of government assistance programs.

  • The law expands, among other things, unemployment benefits and requires businesses to provide employees with roughly two weeks of paid sick leave.




     
  • However, it exempts businesses with more than 500 employees from providing sick leave. As of 2019, companies of this size employed 48% of private-sector workers. Meanwhile, some of the country’s largest employers, such as Walmart, are already expanding paid sick leave for employees afflicted with the virus.
     
  • Some small businesses with fewer than 50 employees are also exempt from the law—small businesses employed 27% of private-sector workers in 2019.
     
  • Prior to the bill, 73% of private-sector workers had paid sick leave, with some occupations more likely to offer it than others. For example, 94% of workers in management and business occupations had paid sick leave, as well as 88% of professional workers. Yet, only 58% of service workers did. 

     

CHANGES TO BUSINESS

Many industries are directly affected both by recent closures and changing consumer behavior. Just how large are these industries and how much do they contribute to the US gross domestic product (GDP)?

  • Food services and drinking places make up an increasing proportion of GDP, from 1.76% in 1997, to 2.23% in 2018. Last year, more than 12 million people worked in food services, particularly restaurants and bars. That’s 8% of the workforce.


  • Travel and hospitality industries are also experiencing dramatic declines in business. More than 2 million Americans work in hotels or similar accommodations.
     

Read all this and much more on how the coronavirus could impact American businesses, including working from home, store closures, and the S&P 500 market index.
 

 

CORONAVIRUS CHECKS

The CARES Act includes plans to send direct payments to taxpayers based on their most recent tax return (either 2019 or 2018). New USAFacts analysis breaks down who will likely to receive these payments.

  • Single filers reporting less than $75,000 in adjusted gross income on tax returns will get the full $1,200 check. Married couples earning less than $150,000 would get $2,400. Some people would also be eligible for an additional $500 for children claimed under the Child Tax Credit.
  • People who made more than $75,000 in 2019 might still receive a check but will have 5% taken out of every dollar earned above $75,000. Single taxpayers who earned more than $99,000 are ineligible for a check.
     
  • According to the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service, 82% of all families would get the full amount offered. Only 8% of families, primarily those in higher income brackets, would get nothing.