Polio may be spreading in the UK for the first time in nearly 40 years, according to the UK health chiefs' warning on 22 June 2022 as they declared polio resurgence a "national incident".
Officials have found traces of a vaccine-derived version of the polio virus type 2 (Vaccine-Derived Polio Virus 2 or VDPV2) in sewage samples in parts of London and say it is "likely" transmitting within the community.
Parents are being urged to ensure their children are up to date with their polio vaccinations, particularly after the pandemic when school immunisation schemes were disrupted.
All British children are supposed to have had the first of three polio jabs as a baby but uptake in London lags behind the rest of the country.
Polio spreads through coughs and sneezes or contact with objects contaminated with faeces, causing permanent paralysis in around one in 100 cases. Children are at a higher risk.
The virus was detected several times between February and May 2022 and has continued to mutate, according to the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA).
It is thought someone vaccinated with the live polio vaccine - which uses a weakened version of the virus - abroad travelled to the UK and shed part of the pathogen in their stool but health officials insist the risk to the public overall is "extremely low", with urgent investigations now underway to find anyone who has been infected.
The last time someone caught polio within the UK was in 1984 but there have been dozens of imported cases since then. Britain was declared polio-free in 2003.
It comes as London battles an outbreak of monkeypox, another rare viral disease that was until recently confined to parts of western and central Africa.
The UKHSA said it found 'several closely related' polioviruses in samples collected from the London Beckton Sewage Treatment Works in Newham.
No cases have been confirmed yet but the UKHSA said it is likely there has been some spread between closely linked individuals in North and East London.
It is normal for traces of the virus to be occasionally detected as part of routine testing of sewage, but the findings are normally a one-off.
These normally come from people who were vaccinated with the live oral vaccine overseas and then travelled to the UK. People given the oral vaccine can shed the weakened live virus used in the vaccine in their faeces for several weeks.
Most countries have switched to polio jabs that use inactivated pieces of virus but some developing nations still rely on the live vaccine.
The London samples have caused concern because they were from different people and contained two mutations that suggest the virus is evolving as it spreads between people.
It is unclear how far the virus has spread but it is hoped the outbreak will be contained to a single household or family.
Polio used to paralyse millions of children around the world every year in the 1940s and 1950s and consign thousands to "iron lungs" — large and expensive machines that helped them breathe.
Most people show no signs of infection at all but about one in 20 people have minor symptoms such as fever, muscle weakness, headache, nausea and vomiting.
Around one in 50 patients develop severe muscle pain and stiffness in the neck and back.
Less than one per cent of polio cases result in paralysis and one in 10 of those result in death.
Dr Vanessa Saliba, a consultant epidemiologist at the UKHSA, said: 'Vaccine-derived poliovirus is rare and the risk to the public overall is extremely low.
"Vaccine-derived poliovirus has the potential to spread, particularly in communities where vaccine uptake is lower.
"On rare occasions it can cause paralysis in people who are not fully vaccinated so if you or your child are not up to date with your polio vaccinations it's important you contact your GP to catch up or if unsure check your red book.
"Most of the UK population will be protected from vaccination in childhood, but in some communities with low vaccine coverage, individuals may remain at risk."
The polio vaccine is offered as part of the NHS routine childhood vaccination programme.
It is given at age eight, 12 and 16 weeks as part of the six-in-one vaccine and then again at three years as part of a pre-school booster. The final course is given at age 14.
Uptake has fallen slightly nationally during the covid pandemic but remains above 90 per cent nationally. Rates are lower in London and in poor and ethnic minority communities.
Just 86.7 per cent of one-year-olds in London have had their first dose dose of polio vaccine compared to the UK average of 92.6 per cent.
There are concerns vaccine hesitancy has risen during the covid crisis due to misinformation spread about jabs for that virus and school closures.
Polio is a highly infectious disease that spreads through coughs and sneezes, bodily fluids or in food, water, clothing or other objects contaminated with faeces.
The virus lives in the throat and intestines for up to six weeks, with patients most infectious from seven to 10 days before and after the onset of symptoms but it can spread to the spinal cord causing muscle weakness and paralysis.
The virus is more common in infants and young children and occurs under conditions of poor hygiene.
There are three strains of "wild" polio, which has been largely eradicated throughout Europe, the Americas, Southeast Asia and the Western Pacific.
Types 2 and 3 were eliminated thanks to a global mass vaccine campaign, with the last cases detected in 1999 and 2012 respectively.
The remaining, type 1, wild polio remains endemic in only two countries, Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Cases have fallen from 350,000 in 1988 to just 33 reported cases in 2018, according to the World Health Organization.
There are still occasionally sporadic cases of vaccine-derived polioviruses, however.
These are strains that were initially used in live vaccines but spilled out into the community and evolved to behave more like the wild version.
VDPV2, the one that has been detected in London, is the most common type. There were nearly 1,000 cases of VDPV2 globally in 2020.
Since 2019 every country in the world has been using vaccines that contain inactivated versions of the virus that cannot cause infection or illness but the UKHSA said countries where the virus is still endemic continue to use the live oral polio vaccine (OPV) in response to flare-ups.
That vaccine brought the wild poliovirus to the brink of eradication and has many benefits but in areas with low vaccination rates, the virus present in the jab can spread and acquire rapid mutations that make it as infectious and virulent as the wild type.
Professor David Heymann, an infectious disease expert at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, said: 'The fact that it has been found in sewage in the UK attests to the strength of the surveillance programmes of UKHSA.
"Its presence in the reminds us that polio eradication has not yet been completed in the world.
"The high vaccination coverage using inactivated polio vaccine in the UK will limit the spread of vaccine derived polio and protect those who have been vaccinated against polio paralysis."
The UK's drugs watchdog and the World Health Organization are working on a vaccine specifically for vaccine-derived polio strains.
It is already being used in parts of Africa, including Nigeria, where these types of strains are endemic.
Dr David Elliman, consultant paediatrician at Great Ormond Street Hospital, said the finding strengthened the importance of vaccinating against eradicated diseases.
"Parents sometimes ask why, when diseases are uncommon in UK, or in the case of polio has been eliminated, do we continue to vaccinate against them.
"The answer is that, although we are an island, we are not isolated from the rest of the world, which means diseases could be brought in from abroad.
"The finding of vaccine derived polio virus in sewage proves the point. Although the uptake of polio vaccines is high in UK, there are children who are unimmunised and therefore at risk of developing polio if in contact with this virus.
"The risk is small, but it is easily preventable by the vaccine, which in the UK is killed and so cannot cause the disease.
"There is no upper age limit for the vaccine. Anyone who is not fully vaccinated against polio should seek advice from their health visitor or general practice."
News (2)
H3N2 subtype influenza surges in many provinces in southern China, and warnings are issued in many places
Emergency warnings for influenza (flu) have been issued successively in Fujian, Guangdong and other provinces in mainland China, and the number of fever clinics has surged.
On 21 June 2022, China Business News reported that in recent days, Guangdong, Jiangxi, Fujian and other southern provinces have successively issued influenza warnings. The latest surveillance data from the China Influenza Center shows that the positive rate of influenza virus detection in southern provinces has continued to rise, and some provinces have entered a high incidence period in summer; the virus is dominated by A (H3N2) subtype influenza virus.
Influenza virus is divided into four types: A, B, C, and D. At present, the main infecting people are A (H1N1) pdm09 and A (H3N2) subtypes in influenza A virus and B (Victoria) and B (Victoria) in influenza B virus. B (Yamagata) system, namely A stream, B stream.
According to data from the Guangdong Center for Disease Control and Prevention, this H3N2 subtype influenza was prevalent in Guangdong Province in the summer of 2015 and 2017.
A reporter from NTDTV found that in June this year, both Hainan CDC and Guangxi CDC also issued flu warnings.
"Guangzhou Daily" reported on 21 June that an average of 7 out of 100 outpatient cases in Guangzhou have flu symptoms, such as fever over 38°C, accompanied by flu symptoms such as cough or sore throat.
According to the Guangzhou Women's and Children's Medical Center, since the end of May, the number of single-day fever clinics in the two campuses of the hospital has increased significantly. In the past three days, it has doubled the same period last year, and it is still at its peak.
"Shenzhen All Contact" reported that from 8 to 14 June 2022, 5 out of 100 outpatient cases in Shenzhen on average were patients with fever over 38°C and flu symptoms such as cough or sore throat. Of these, 48% were children between the ages of 0 and 14.
"Xiamen Daily" pointed out that there are long queues at Xiamen Children's Hospital both during the day and at night. The staff of the hospital's fever clinic department said that a lot of parents have brought their children to see a doctor in the past two weeks, and the peak period is from 2 to 3 pm every day.
Kang Min, director of infectious disease prevention and control at the Guangdong Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said on the Guangdong CDC WeChat official account on the 21st that there are many reasons for Guangdong to enter the summer influenza peak. For example, the epidemic has accumulated a large number of susceptible people in the past two years; The virus strain has the characteristics of high epidemic intensity, high infection rate and fast mutation frequency.
Wei Min, chief physician of the Department of Respiratory Medicine at the Sixth Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University in Guangzhou, said that influenza is common in winter and spring in the north, and occurs throughout the year in the south. The temperature has dropped.
News (3)
Li Keqiang's inspection in Hebei issued a series of warnings
Editor : Wen Hui / https://www.ntdtv.com/gb/2022/06/22/a103462048.html / Image : On 25 April 2022, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang once again warned the government to "tighten life" and demanded that the economic fundamentals be stabilized. Data map. (Andrea Verdelli/Getty Images)
When Premier Li Keqiang visited Hebei Province on 21 June 2022, he issued a series of warnings. He demanded to do a good job in summer harvesting and summer seeds and ensuring energy supply, "resolutely prevent power outages", and provide support for stabilizing prices, ensuring people's livelihood, and stabilizing the overall economic market.
According to the CCP’s official media, Li Keqiang said when he visited Gaobeidian, Zhuozhou and other places in Hebei Province on the 21st that sufficient food supply is crucial to stabilizing prices and keeping the economy operating within a reasonable range. Two important indicators are stabilizing employment and stabilizing prices. , food and energy are the basic support for stabilizing prices.
Li Keqiang specifically mentioned that it is necessary to "coordinate epidemic prevention and control and economic and social development, implement various policies to stabilize the economy", and do a good job in summer harvesting and summer planting.
Li Keqiang's remarks seem to be a warning to the local "dynamic clearing" of extreme epidemic prevention practices. At the beginning of May this year, an old farmer in Hebei went to work in the field during the epidemic prevention and control period. After being criticized by the inspectors, the old farmer was forced to use a loudspeaker along the street to apologize to the whole village to review and "walk the street" by himself. There are also farmers who secretly go down to the fields in the middle of the night to cultivate the land.
After the relevant video came out, netizens condemned the local officials for only focusing on "dynamic clearing", ignoring the hardships of people's livelihood, wanton abuse of power, and misbehavior.
Li Keqiang issued another warning when he inspected a coal-fired power generation company in Hebei province. He said that now is the critical period of peak electricity consumption in summer, and it is necessary to increase coal production capacity, strengthen power supply guarantee, resolutely prevent power outages, and ensure economic operation and basic people's livelihood.
Prior to this, Li Keqiang had repeatedly called for stabilizing the economy and launched a series of measures to stabilize the economy, but so far there has been no obvious effect. Economists believe that China's economy has fallen into a liquidity trap.
"Hong Kong 01" reported that Tao Dong, Managing Director of Credit Suisse Asia Pacific Private Banking and Vice Chairman of Greater China, said recently that China's economy has fallen into a liquidity trap, and continued credit expansion has failed to stimulate bank loans and corporate investment. He believes that the key to stabilizing the current economic situation is to restore market confidence.
However, he said that business demand is still sluggish, a situation not seen in many years, and it can be seen that the government's incentive loan tool in the past seems to be inefficient in the current economic environment.
News (4)
Normalized nucleic acid testing is difficult to last, Hefei and other places announced the suspension
Reporter : Zheng Gusheng / Editor: Lin Qing / https://www.ntdtv.com/gb/2022/06/22/a103462197.html /
Image : On 26 May 2022, a worker in a protective suit samples a woman for a nucleic acid test for covid at a testing site on the streets of Beijing. (Kevin Frayer/Getty Images)
The CCP's so-called "normalization of nucleic acid testing" labours people and hurts money, and local finances are also difficult to support. Recently, several cities, including Hefei, the capital of Anhui, have announced suspensions of nucleic acid testing.
On 21 June 2022, the Hefei Epidemic Prevention Headquarters held a meeting and announced that from the 22nd, free nucleic acid testing in normalized areas will be suspended, and only employees in high-risk industries will continue to implement "exhaustive inspections".
The official did not announce the follow-up "how to carry out nucleic acid screening more scientifically, accurately and effectively", only that "there will be further research arrangements".
In addition to Hefei, Huainan in Anhui, Jixi County in Xuancheng, She County in Huangshan, and the High-tech Zone have also recently announced that they will suspend normalized nucleic acid testing every 5 days or 7 days. Jiangsu Tongzhou Bay Demonstration Zone and Jiangsu Mei'an City have also suspended the normalized inspection of regional nucleic acid testing. Hefei is the most populous of these cities.
The National Health Commission of the Communist Party of China has announced that port cities, provincial capital cities and cities with a population of 10 million should establish nucleic acid "sampling circles" of 15 minutes' walk. Subsequently, "nucleic acid fever" appeared in many places, and the construction of nucleic acid sampling houses has also become a hot and lucrative industry, and people from all walks of life have entered.
However, the authorities also announced that local governments are prohibited from using medical insurance to pay for normalized nucleic acid testing, and the "nucleic acid fever" has cooled down.
The normalization of nucleic acid testing requires huge investment, and it is difficult to support the increasingly tight local government finances. Some places have forced citizens to pay for nucleic acid testing.
On 9 June 2022, the National Health Commission of the Communist Party of China changed its tune and said, "If there is no epidemic and there is no risk of importation, nucleic acid inspection should not become the norm." Many places have begun to cancel and suspend normalized nucleic acid testing one after another.
Normalized nucleic acid testing is said to be unable to "clear" the virus at all, but instead increases the chance of cluster infection, while taking up a lot of residents' time and dampening the economy but the CCP authorities "persistently insist on dynamic clearing", and many cities continue to implement this policy.
News (5)
Donate household PCR again "To be 2024 Presidential Candidate?" Guo Taiming let go
Image : Terry Gou Taiming, the founder of Hon Hai. (Picture/TVBS data screen)
The founder of Hon Hai & Yongling Foundation, Terry Gou, invested in the development of home nucleic acid detection PCR machines. On 22 June, he personally went to Taoyuan to donate 160 units to long-term care institutions. He was asked if he would run for president in the future? He emphasized that "politics is not an option for me" and made it clearer that "a more suitable person should be chosen to lead (Taiwan)."
Image : Guo Taiming recently personally went to various places to donate household PCR machines. (Picture/TVBS)
The domestic demand for covi screening has greatly increased. Terry Gou's personal investment in Fujia Biotechnology, which developed a PCR machine for home nucleic acid detection, has recently been approved by the Ministry of Health and Welfare Food and Drug Administration (EUA) for project manufacturing. He went to Taoyuan today to donate 160 nucleic acid detectors and 9,000 nucleic acid detection kits to local long-term care institutions.
Image : The first domestic nucleic acid detection PCR machine in the Republic of China. (Picture/TVBS data screen)
In an interview, Guo Taiming was asked if he would run for the presidency in 2024. He responded, "I still have one word, politics is not my option", emphasizing that the current focus is on the biotechnology industry, gene therapy and cancer issues, hoping to benefit the health of the people. Guo Taiming also said that there are many ways to give back to the society, and politics is not the only option. "You should choose a more suitable person to lead (Taiwan)."
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