Biden to Send Vaccines to India; U.S. Probes Clots: Virus Update

(Bloomberg) -- Fully vaccinated Americans don’t have to wear masks when exercising, dining and socializing outdoors in small groups, federal health officials said. It’s one of the most significant relaxations of guidelines since the pandemic began.

Two new cases of blood clots linked to Johnson & Johnson’s Covid-19 vaccine are being investigated by U.S. health officials. France is starting trials of so-called vaccine passports, putting it at the forefront of efforts to jump-start travel.

President Joe Biden said he intends to send vaccines from the U.S. to India as the country battles the worst coronavirus surge in the world, but didn’t specify timing for a decision or shipments. Russia protested a decision by Brazilian health regulators to block imports of its Sputnik V vaccine.

Key Developments

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Republicans Promote Vaccine (5:52 p.m. NY)

A group of Republican lawmakers in the U.S. with backgrounds as medical professionals launched a public service campaign to encourage people to get vaccinations as polls show a substantial minority of their party supporters are resisting getting the shot.

Wyoming Senator John Barrasso, a physician, said that vaccine hesitancy in his home state is one of the reasons that he wanted to take part in the campaign, which was initiated by Senator Roger Marshall of Kansas, who is also a medical doctor.

“You want to get kind of blanket immunity. You want to have enough people to have had vaccinations, and they’re not perfect but they’re pretty darn good,” Barrasso said in an interview. “And that’s the way out of it.”

Houston-Area Leaders Shutting Vaccination Hub (4:39 p.m. NY)

County leaders in suburban Houston have decided to shut a mass-vaccination hub due to dwindling demand.

The site at a high school football stadium in the Houston suburb of Shenandoah may close as soon as mid-June, Jason Millsaps, executive director of the Montgomery County Office of Emergency Management and Homeland Security, told the Houston Chronicle. The decision comes a week after the Texas port city of Galveston announced it’ll shutter its mass-vaccination center on May 1 amid dropping demand and the expanding availability of shots from alternative sources.

Russia Protests After Brazil Rejects Sputnik (3:30 p.m. NY)

Russia protested a decision by Brazilian health regulators to block imports of the Sputnik V vaccine, citing a “lack of consistent and reliable data” on the shot’s safety, quality and efficacy.

The five-member board of the Brazilian Health Surveillance Agency, or Anvisa, said in a late Tuesday statement that it had identified product-development flaws in all three phases of the drug’s clinical trials. The notoriously strict regulatory body stressed that it was unable to identify the source of the vaccine’s pharmaceutical materials, adding that it wasn’t given full access to facilities during a recent inspection visit to Russia.

Sputnik V’s developers dismissed the findings as political, saying on Wednesday that Anvisa had been pressured by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to block the Russian vaccine. They also denied that Brazilian regulators had been barred from production sites that would supply to Brazil.

Biden to Send Vaccines to India (3:05 p.m. NY)

President Joe Biden said he intends to send vaccines from the U.S. to India as the country battles the worst coronavirus surge in the world, but did not specify timing for a decision or shipments.

Biden said Tuesday that in a call with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, he discussed “when we’ll be able to send actual vaccines to India, which is my intention to do.”

In the meantime, the U.S. is providing aid including the therapeutic drug remdisivir and machinery for vaccine manufacturing, Biden said.

N.Y. Opens Vaccine Sites to Walk-Ins (1:55 p.m. NY)

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo will open all state-run mass vaccination sites to walk-ins on Thursday, removing the barrier to make an appointment ahead of time for adults age 16 and over.

Cuomo said the change comes as demand for the vaccine has dropped. “We were doing 175,000 vaccines statewide every 24 hours; that number is down to about 115,000 vaccines every 24 hours,” he said during a briefing Tuesday.

Nearly 46% of New Yorkers have received at least one dose of the vaccine, compared with the U.S. average of 42.5%, according to the Bloomberg Vaccine Tracker.

Exxon Moving Houston Workers Back to Office (11:18 a.m. NY)

Exxon Mobil Corp. told its Houston-area workforce that all employees will be back in the office on a full-time basis by May 17.

Workers will be required to wear masks and take other anti-pandemic measures in the office until further notice, the oil explorer said in an internal email on Tuesday that was seen by Bloomberg News.

No Sign of Infection After Concert: BBC (10:35 a.m. NY)

Researchers in Spain have found “no sign” of higher levels of infection among people who took part in a large test concert last month, the BBC reported. Six people tested positive within 14 days of attending the show in Barcelona, but the incidence was lower than that seen in the general population, the BBC said. Around 5,000 music fans took part in the experiment after testing negative for Covid-19. Concert-goers wore masks but didn’t have to socially distance.

U.S. Probes 2 New Clot Cases Tied to J&J (10:35 a.m. NY)

Two new cases of blood clots linked to Johnson & Johnson’s Covid-19 vaccine are being investigated by federal health officials, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Tuesday.

One case was in a male and the other was in a female, both of whom were under 60 years old, a CDC spokeswoman said in an email to Bloomberg News. The new reports bring the total number of cases to 17 out of about 8.1 million doses administered in the U.S.

The CDC and the Food and Drug Administration lifted a recommended pause on use of J&J’s vaccine Friday following an investigation into blood clots possibly linked to the shot. The 15 cases being examined were all in women, though CDC officials cautioned the syndrome may also occur in men.

Portugal Sending Medical Supplies to India (8:26 a.m. NY)

Portugal plans to send antiviral drugs for Covid-19 treatment and oxygen to India as part of a broader European Union effort. Portugal is currently evaluating the fastest way within the EU framework to transport the medicine and oxygen to India, the Portuguese Foreign Ministry said in an emailed statement.

Johnson’s Office Denies He Said Let Virus Rip (8:07 a.m. NY)

“The reports put forward, speculation, they distort the actions the prime minister has taken, which is to save lives and livelihoods,” said Max Blain, Boris Johnson’s official spokesman, when asked whether Johnson said the virus should be allowed to let “rip.”

Blain said it is “untrue” that Johnson made a comment that bodies should be allowed to “pile high” instead of imposing a third coronavirus lockdown.

Plastic Surgeons See Boom Below Zoom Line (8:05 a.m. NY)

As more Americans get back to the office and restaurants reopen, tummy tucks and liposuction are poised for a comeback.

In a national survey of 1,000 women, 1 in 10 indicated they are more interested in cosmetic plastic surgery or non-surgical procedures now than before the pandemic, according to the American Society of Plastic Surgeons.

City of London Plans for Life Post-Covid (8 a.m. NY)

The City of London is planning for life after the pandemic. Overseers of the sparsely populated area announced plans on Tuesday to build at least 1,500 homes in the next decade, along with exploring new ways to repurpose empty space. It’s already flagged ambitions to develop 122,500 square meters (1.3 million square feet) of shopping space over 15 years.

Vacancies across the City have soared 70% since the onset of the pandemic, according to Savills Plc.

France Starts Vaccine-Passport Trials (7:54 a.m. NY)

France said it’s moving toward a rollout of so-called vaccine passports aimed a jump-starting travel as trials start on internal flights, while planning discussions on the reopening of trans-Atlantic services.

The country’s year-old Covid-19 tracing app has been equipped with a new function and is being deployed on short-haul services between Paris and the Mediterranean island of Corsica, French Transport Minister Jean-Baptiste Djebbari said Tuesday.

Talks have been held with the U.K. on bilateral travel arrangements and discussions with the U.S. will be next, Djebbari said, with France targeting “a return to normal of flights in the next weeks and months.”

Philippines to Ban Travelers From India (7:43 a.m. NY)

The Philippines will ban all travelers from India and those with history of travel to the country in the last 14 days. The ban will be in effect from April 29 to May 14, President Rodrigo Duterte’s spokesman, Harry Roque, said in a statement.

Australia is also banning all flights from India until at least May 15. Malaysia will halt entry of Indian nationals and passengers as well as implement strict controls for ships from the South Asian country docking at the nation’s ports.

HSBC to Cut Office Space, Halves Travel (7:36 a.m. NY)

HSBC Holdings Plc expects to cut its office footprint by 20% this year and is budgeting for half its previous business travel costs as the adoption of flexible working spurs changes to longstanding practices.

The bank has already committed to a 40% reduction in office space in the long term.

“We do very much want to move to a hybrid working environment,” Chief Financial Officer Ewen Stevenson said in an interview with Bloomberg Television.

Bharat Biotech Shot Shows Variant Protection (7:18 a.m. NY)

Blood samples from people recovering from Covid-19 infection and vaccinated with Bharat Biotech’s Covaxin shot show some protection against the variant first found in India, known as B.1.617, according to a local study. The patients’ neutralizing antibodies weren’t as effective against the variant as they were against other older strains, according to the scientists from India’s National Institute of Virology.

Further studies are needed, the researchers wrote. The research was submitted on the bioRxiv server and wasn’t peer-reviewed.

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