The Dose 10-25-2021

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An open thread for gentle discussions of all things Covid.

YAOTATC (Yet Another Open Thread for All Things Covid)

I won't be here to host this, please be civil and respectful of each other

The floor is yours

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That's right, one death. Reported Oct. 23, 2021.

Current population of Nigeria a disturbingly high 213,000,000 or thereabouts. *Something* is going to knock that down eventually, but in the short run it doesn't look like it's going to be Covid as the total reported deaths since Feb. 2020 come to just 2,856. By way of comparison, as of October 22, the US' 7 day average for daily Covid deaths was 1467 per *day*.

Number of vaccine doses in Nigeria (not rate of "full" vaccination) as of 10/24 per 100 people = 4.

Proving once again that universal vaccination is the only way to escape the pandemic scourge.

Not clear if the Nigerian experience was the result of this prominent Nigerian virologist's advice being taken or not, but the result would seem to be much the same as if it was:

Vaccination could jeopardise our natural immunity to COVID-19, virologist cautions
By Sola Ogundipe
January 6, 2021

A renowned virologist, Prof Sunday Omilabu, has cautioned against vaccinating Nigerians that have acquired natural immunity to the COVID-19 virus.

Omilabu who is the director of the Centre for Human and Zoonotic Virology at the Lagos University Teaching Hospital and the College of Medicine, University of Lagos, said giving the COVID-19 vaccine to such people could jeopardize their natural immunity.

The virologist, who is currently working on the sequencing of the Nigerian variant of the COVID-19 virus discovered recently, warned that Nigeria and other African countries should handle the issue of vaccination cautiously because most Africans have an innate immunity that is playing down on the virulence of the virus.

Speaking on the heels of the Federal government’s announcement that 100,000 doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines were being expected in the country by the end of January, the scientist said only persons with confirmed low immunity should be immunised because they stand to benefit the most from the vaccine.

“In Nigeria and other African countries, we have to be cautious because we have an innate immunity that is playing down on the virulence of the virus,” he stated.

“At present, the majority of us are carrying the virus without knowing that we carry it because the immunity in us is fighting the virus and playing it down so that the virulence will not show. We only see the virus’ effects in people with low level immunity,” he argued.

Omilabu said: “We are not experiencing the same virulence they are experiencing abroad, so if we should now introduce a vaccine to an individual that has innate immunity, the vaccine might jeopardize that immunity.

“My advice would be that before we jab anybody, we should make sure that they have low level immunity to SARS-COV2 (Covid-19) virus otherwise, the vaccine could jeopardise the natural immunity that we are enjoying right away.

“It is that natural immunity that is actually blocking the virus from causing adverse effects in the individuals that have the immunity. Those whose immunity is zero need to be primed so that they would have some level of immunity to depend on.

“You should do an antibody test first, so that we can know the level of natural immunity which is our level of exposure to related coronaviruses that have been in the environment for years.

“This innate immunity has a role to protect us from infection by a related virus. That is the principle of vaccination – for vaccines to develop some level of immunity in an individual before that individual is exposed to a disease pathogen,” he remarked.

Yes, the US has succeeded so well by ignoring virtually all of this guy's warnings and advice...

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Lookout's picture

@Blue Republic

A neuroscientist, Dr. Chidi Njemanze, says majority of Nigerians have developed strong immunity against COVID-19 and might not need the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines expected in the country by the end of the month.

https://lawandsocietymagazine.com/nigerians-who-have-used-ivermectin-may...

Additionally...

A recent study in Nigeria shows that using Ivermectin-only (IVM) to treat COVID-19 patients is equally as effective as using the HIA triple therapy (Hydroxychloroquine, Ivermectin, and Azithromycin Combination) in all inflammatory, virological, and respiratory endpoints.

Still IVM is literally banded in Australia and the UK. The US has something like 100,000 IVM prescriptions in the last week or so, and a decline in COVID as well. Imagine my surprise.

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

@Lookout Covid situation in Nigeria and much of the continent of Africa to the list of important items not covered by our corporate media. Of course, if they did, the discussion might naturally come around to innate immune systems and perhaps why they are so robust against the virus, which the media cannot allow.

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Pluto's Republic's picture

@Lookout

...Covid-19 first appeared around winter solstice, in populated areas around the world that were located adjacent to, or just above, the 37th parallel. Harvard told us so.

This latitude band was populated by people who were experiencing a precipitous Vitamin D deficiency — particularly people of color, who were always low on Vitamin D when occupying this parallel.

It was also known that supplementing with Vitamin D in this parallel would flatten out the impact of flu season becauseVitamin D enhanced the immune system that protected the respiratory system. In 2020, when so many were taking Vitamin D to ward off the pandemic, the expected yearly flu couldn't take hold.

People indigenous to Africa who live north of the 37th parallel tend to be significantly deficient in Vitamin D, which results in inflammation, leading to chronic health threats like high blood pressure. Their life spans than those with fair skin who occupy the same areas.

For nearly a decade, scientists at bio-labs around the world have been collecting and sequencing coronaviruses from bats. In 2017, Wuhan was asked to join the search on behalf of the US. Caves occupied by bats can be found in most countries. Each cave colony has unique coronaviruses that can only be found there. So far, none of these labs, including the Wuhan Institute of Virology, has found the bat coronavirus that is related to SARS-CoV-2.

Nonetheless, knowing all this, the medical industry has not protected humans by educating them about vitamin D supplementation during the winter months.

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____________________

The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
CB's picture

@Pluto's Republic
in the first 2-4 months at the outbreak of COVID-19 had failed and/or served to exacerbate the COVID-19 pandemic. This ensured the virus was spread and took hold throughout the country. There was no advice from the CDC such as taking vitamins and other simple steps that one could do to ameliorate the worse effects of the disease.

To this date, TPTB still don't offer ANY advice other than social distancing, wearing ineffective masks and vaccination that does minimal to prevent this contagion. They still don't recommend inexpensive, proven prophylactics despite hundreds of medical reports and studies that prove pathogenesis of the virus can be substantially reduced.

EVERYTHING TPTB are currently doing is pushing the herd to a singularity - that of individual 'tagging' giving them the capability of effective monitoring and subsequent control.

Welcome to 1984 where you can be found guilty of thought crime if you don't obey the mantra: "Vaccination, Vaccination, Vaccination."

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snoopydawg's picture

@CB

High rates of heart attacks, strokes, gastrointestinal problems and many other issues. They can’t seem to figure out why. People are waiting for hours in hallways for rooms in the ERs. And yet more medical staff are being fired. And the shitlibs are very happy with it. Hope none need emergency attention anytime soon. The nurse that they might need won’t be there for them.

The FDA is meeting today to decide whether to authorize vaccines for kids. 4 countries have discontinued giving them to kids. But even if they decide against it Walensky can over ride them and do it anyway.

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CB's picture

@snoopydawg
Live FDA Advisory Committee Reviews EUA Pfizer Vaccines For 5-11 Year Olds

Meanwhile the Feds have already paid for 35 million, non-refundable doses that will come within a week or two.

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Lookout's picture

Azazello posted this yesterday...
Harper's From this month's Index:

Percentage change since 2019 in the number of Republicans who say that large corporations benefit the country: -44
In the number of Democrats who say so: +22
In the number of Republicans who say that financial institutions benefit the country: -21
In the number of Democrats who say so: +30

I added dims are now pro-censorship and rethugs are anti-censorship

Chris interviewed a rethuglican candidate and doctor last week focusing mainly on COVID

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pT2L9L_N8Bs]

Chris sits down with Dr. Scott Jensen, M.D., a successful family medicine/general practitioner and former Minnesota state senator, now running for the hotly contested Minnesota governor’s seat this November.

Dr. Jensen reflects on his decision to enter the race, and the political arena in general, as a direct result of the rise of authoritarianism and associated societal collapse which have emerged following the COVID-19 pandemic. He fears what without a swift redirect back toward traditional doctor-patient relationships and a renewed trust with our government and public institutions, that the U.S. will face the same grim fate of other failed states.

The old labels and divisions no longer apply from my point of view. May be times are evolving beyond a left/right division. At any rate I found it an interesting conversation and hope you do as well. Didn't agree with everything, but I sure want to hear more evidence based discussions in the public sphere.

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

@Lookout @Lookout Rs who hold sane positions on Covid measures, he's closer to my stance than this current crop of sorry Ds. But outside of that area, he sounds like a typical R -- worried about crime and erosion of 2A rights (sigh...), overtaxation generally but not a lot to say about under-taxation of big corps and the rich, some vague concerns about "election integrity" but doesn't mention T's Big Lie or Trump's toxic influence on democracy. So, as with Ron Johnson and Rand Paul, I'll accept his alliance on Covid matters, but otherwise he seems just Minnesota Nice Typical Republican.

On the Harper's numbers, check. In the other place I often post, on a big social media platform's invite-only Dem group, overwhelmingly the members appear to be getting their news primarily from the two traditional cables, which they consider 99% accurate and trustworthy. In a recent discussion involving the Rogan interview of Sanjay Gupta, I was alone in defending Rogan, while the rest of that small insular town backed that wonderful doctor Sanjay and CNN, and found it odd that rich guy Rogan was giving out dangerously wrong medical advice on Covid while taking "horse medicine". They are nearly as impervious to true facts and reason as are many on the far-right.

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snoopydawg's picture

This seems criminal to me.

Given all of the above, how on earth did the FDA claim any benefits at all from this shot? You should probably sit down for this part because it’s a doozy! Here’s the key sentence:

Vaccine effectiveness was inferred by immunobridging SARS-CoV-2 50% neutralizing antibody titers (NT50, SARS-CoV-2 mNG microneutralization assay).

Wait, what!? I’ll explain. There were ZERO cases of severe COVID-19 in the clinical trial of children ages 5 to 11. So Pfizer and the FDA just ignored all of the actual health outcomes (they had to, there is no emergency, so the application is moot). INSTEAD Pfizer switched to looking at antibodies in the blood. In general, antibodies are a poor predictor of immunity. And the antibodies in the blood of these 5 to 11 year old children tell us nothing because again, there were zero cases of severe COVID-19 in this study (none in the treatment group, none in the control group). So Pfizer had to get creative! What they came up with is “immuno-bridging”. Pfizer looked at the level of antibodies in the bloodwork of another study, this one involving people 16 to 25 years old, figured out the level of antibodies that seems to be protective in that population, then figured out how many kids ages 5 to 11 had similar levels of antibodies in their blood, and then came up with a number for how many cases, hospitalizations, ICU admissions, and deaths would be prevented by this shot in the 5 to 11 population in the future, based on the antibody levels and health outcomes from the 16 to 25 year old population. If your head hurts from that tortured logic, it should, because such chicanery is unprecedented in a risk-benefit analysis.

So when the FDA uses this tortured logic at the beginning of their briefing document, all of the calculations that stem from this will be flat out wrong. Not just wrong but preposterous and criminally wrong.

I hadn’t read that before I said it, but damn! Plus they had low numbers included in the trial and they only followed them for 17 days. And they might have given the control group the vaccine. Fauci is complicit in the biggest fraud in history and then there’s his cruelty to animals including dawgs. I haven’t read anything on the dawg story because it’s too gawd awful for my heart, but just knowing about it is causing lots of grief. Beagles are so precious to me and some of the best dawgs I’ve had. All dawgs are special, but beagles are just something else. I’ve never had a dawg that does such special and funny antics that they did.

I’m listening to this now. Just ANOTHER doctor against mandatory vaccines. He talks about childhood vaccines and how they are different from the Rona ones.

https://rumble.com/vo6chr-viral-immunologist-dr.-byram-bridle-speaks-at-...

16 min.

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@snoopydawg for both Kirsch and Bridle. We need more outspoken voices on Covid vaccines and mandates from our considerable ultra-rich cohort, and Kirsch is doing good work.

The Bridle speech reminds me of the total absence of such reasonable dissenting voices in literal public forums at least in my area of small towns. It would be a great idea to have such local events, going around the MSM blackout, if only these type of gatherings could be free of the politics and inevitable anti-vax or Trump signs. Otherwise, our lovely local parks and town squares seem rather lonely and underutilized and only seem to exist on paper as places for free speech.

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snoopydawg's picture

Just as bad is the number of people who agree with him. Mostly shitlibs.

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@snoopydawg Old Man is really revealing itself on the mandates. Once before, many yrs ago when he was a Cranky Young Man, I took serious issue with him on the JFK assassination when he announced his support for the Warren Comm'n and basically painted JFK as a warmongering Cold Warrior.

In recent yrs, Chomsky has also supported US military involvement in Syria, to protect Syrian Kurds.

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once great, now a shitlib, with little regard for the lives of those who beg to differ.

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"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

@on the cusp
He and Biden speak the same language. Both seem married to their cue cards….and then the drivel and incoherence proceed like an automaton from the ‘Small World’ from the 60’s Worlds Fair.

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Capitalism is the extraordinary belief that the nastiest of men for the nastiest of motives will somehow work for the benefit of all."
- John Maynard Keynes

ggersh's picture

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I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish

"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"

Heard from Margaret Kimberley

snoopydawg's picture

Im not stupid or uniformed

CDC To ‘Educate And Counsel’ Those Who Refuse COVID-19 Vaccine

“There is a plan, should these people not want to be vaccinated, toward education and counseling to get people the information they need,"

During the interview, Walensky also noted that despite reports last week, booster shots will not be changing individuals’ vaccination status. “I want to be very clear about that,” she said. “We do not have a plan to change that definition right now.”

When asked about Joe Biden’s claims that police officers and first responders should be fired from their jobs for refusing the vaccine, mocking the idea of Americans touting their “freedom” to refuse an injection that does not prevent them from getting or spreading the virus, Walensky said “The most disruptive thing you can do to a workforce is to have a Covid outbreak in that workforce. That will most definitely not only send people home but it will send people to the hospital and some may pass.”

“What we know from the police workforce is there have been more deaths from the coronavirus over the last year and a half than all other causes of death for that workforce combined. So we believe it is very important to get these people vaccinated,” Walensky argued. “There is a plan, should these people not want to be vaccinated, toward education and counseling to get people the information they need so that they are feeling comfortable in getting vaccinated.”

Explanation for ADE?

As National File previously reported, CDC data suggests that the “fourth wave” of the coronavirus pandemic in the United States appears to be more than twice as deadly as the so-called “second wave,” which occurred prior to hundreds of millions of Americans receiving COVID-19 vaccinations.

From September 1 to September 10 of 2020, reported US COVID-19 daily deaths never exceeded 960, according to the CDC data. From September 1 to September 10 of 2021, the daily death rates were as high as 1,860.

Umm they already feel comfortable in not getting vaccinated you dweeb. They’ve educated themselves on what the vaccines do and what they do not do and it’s why they made their decision. But I’d like to know just how this education is going to go. I bet people will be educating the teachers who are trying to educate them. Stay tuned. Hopefully it doesn’t include camping..heh.

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Lookout's picture

mandates, dictates, and passports.
https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/covid-protest-draws-thousands-to-swiss-capi...
Huge protests in Switzerland. Protests in Estonia, Ireland, Italy and France
9 min
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JxVaGk-F9Bo]

Me thinks this won't work out well for TPTB? I sure hope it doesn't work out so well for them!

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

CB's picture

YouTube trying to ban

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CRjO52VOITo]

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@CB Thanks.

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"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

snoopydawg's picture

Hope this gets some attention.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33113270/

Results of the study: COVID-19 vaccines designed to elicit neutralising antibodies may sensitise vaccine recipients to more severe disease than if they were not vaccinated. Vaccines for SARS, MERS and RSV have never been approved, and the data generated in the development and testing of these vaccines suggest a serious mechanistic concern: that vaccines designed empirically using the traditional approach (consisting of the unmodified or minimally modified coronavirus viral spike to elicit neutralising antibodies), be they composed of protein, viral vector, DNA or RNA and irrespective of delivery method, may worsen COVID-19 disease via antibody-dependent enhancement (ADE). This risk is sufficiently obscured in clinical trial protocols and consent forms for ongoing COVID-19 vaccine trials that adequate patient comprehension of this risk is unlikely to occur, obviating truly informed consent by subjects in these trials.

Conclusions drawn from the study and clinical implications: The specific and significant COVID-19 risk of ADE should have been and should be prominently and independently disclosed to research subjects currently in vaccine trials, as well as those being recruited for the trials and future patients after vaccine approval, in order to meet the medical ethics standard of patient comprehension for informed consent.

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snoopydawg's picture

Ain’t it obvious now?

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@snoopydawg oh man.

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"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

CB's picture

Increases in COVID-19 are unrelated to levels of vaccination across 68 countries and 2947 counties in the United States
Eur J Epidemiol. 2021 Sep 30

Associated Data

Vaccines currently are the primary mitigation strategy to combat COVID-19 around the world. For instance, the narrative related to the ongoing surge of new cases in the United States (US) is argued to be driven by areas with low vaccination rates [1]. A similar narrative also has been observed in countries, such as Germany and the United Kingdom [2]. At the same time, Israel that was hailed for its swift and high rates of vaccination has also seen a substantial resurgence in COVID-19 cases [3]. We investigate the relationship between the percentage of population fully vaccinated and new COVID-19 cases across 68 countries and across 2947 counties in the US.
...
Findings

At the country-level, there appears to be no discernable relationship between percentage of population fully vaccinated and new COVID-19 cases in the last 7 days (Fig. 1). In fact, the trend line suggests a marginally positive association such that countries with higher percentage of population fully vaccinated have higher COVID-19 cases per 1 million people. Notably, Israel with over 60% of their population fully vaccinated had the highest COVID-19 cases per 1 million people in the last 7 days. The lack of a meaningful association between percentage population fully vaccinated and new COVID-19 cases is further exemplified, for instance, by comparison of Iceland and Portugal. Both countries have over 75% of their population fully vaccinated and have more COVID-19 cases per 1 million people than countries such as Vietnam and South Africa that have around 10% of their population fully vaccinated.
...
Across the US counties too, the median new COVID-19 cases per 100,000 people in the last 7 days is largely similar across the categories of percent population fully vaccinated (Fig. 2). Notably there is also substantial county variation in new COVID-19 cases within categories of percentage population fully vaccinated. There also appears to be no significant signaling of COVID-19 cases decreasing with higher percentages of population fully vaccinated (Fig. 3).
...
Interpretation

The sole reliance on vaccination as a primary strategy to mitigate COVID-19 and its adverse consequences needs to be re-examined, especially considering the Delta (B.1.617.2) variant and the likelihood of future variants. Other pharmacological and non-pharmacological interventions may need to be put in place alongside increasing vaccination rates. Such course correction, especially with regards to the policy narrative, becomes paramount with emerging scientific evidence on real world effectiveness of the vaccines.

For instance, in a report released from the Ministry of Health in Israel, the effectiveness of 2 doses of the BNT162b2 (Pfizer-BioNTech) vaccine against preventing COVID-19 infection was reported to be 39% [6], substantially lower than the trial efficacy of 96% [7]. It is also emerging that immunity derived from the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine may not be as strong as immunity acquired through recovery from the COVID-19 virus [8]. A substantial decline in immunity from mRNA vaccines 6-months post immunization has also been reported [9]. Even though vaccinations offers protection to individuals against severe hospitalization and death, the CDC reported an increase from 0.01 to 9% and 0 to 15.1% (between January to May 2021) in the rates of hospitalizations and deaths, respectively, amongst the fully vaccinated [10].

In summary, even as efforts should be made to encourage populations to get vaccinated it should be done so with humility and respect. Stigmatizing populations can do more harm than good. Importantly, other non-pharmacological prevention efforts (e.g., the importance of basic public health hygiene with regards to maintaining safe distance or handwashing, promoting better frequent and cheaper forms of testing) needs to be renewed in order to strike the balance of learning to live with COVID-19 in the same manner we continue to live a 100 years later with various seasonal alterations of the 1918 Influenza virus.
...

News article on this study:

Vaccination Rates Not Linked to Lower COVID Rates, Epidemiology Paper Finds
A new paper in the European Journal of Epidemiology that analyzed 68 countries and 2,947 US counties found that higher vaccination rates were not associated with fewer COVID-19 cases.
Friday, October 15, 2021

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CB's picture

There's a special place in hell for the f*ckers that did this.

Father accuses school of tying mask to head of disabled daughter
October 24, 2021

Florida school officials forced a little girl with Down Syndrome to wear a mask by tying it to her head for six weeks, her angry dad claims.

Jeffrey Steele, father of nonverbal 7-year old Sofia Steele, told Fox News that he only found out about the practice when his daughter got off the school bus on Oct. 7 with a mask strapped to her face, soaked with her saliva.

Steele said that Sophia has an enlarged tongue and breathes through her mouth, making wearing a mask potentially dangerous.

She reportedly attended Ocean Breeze Elementary School in Indian Harbour Beach, which had implemented its own mask mandate in September in defiance of anti-mask mandate executive orders by Gov. Ron DeSantis.
...

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJuOJUSNOVM]

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CB's picture

@CB

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CB's picture

Sweden Suspends Moderna Shot Indefinitely After Vaxxed Patients Develop Crippling Heart Condition
October 21, 2021

New concerns are being raised about side effects from the Moderna vaccine against the coronavirus.

Swedish health officials have now decided that a moratorium on giving the Moderna vaccine to anyone under 31 will be extended indefinitely, the U.K. Daily Mail reported. The pause on the Moderna shots had been scheduled to end on Dec. 1.

Finland, Iceland and Denmark have taken similar steps. Norway is encouraging men under 30 not to get the Moderna shot, but is not mandating it.
...

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