>allowing people’s ballots to be printed at home on computer paper
"You're a scumbag, dude."
>Klaus Schwab is literally a mad German scientist
https://www.grassley.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/justice_dept.tograssleyjohnsonhennesseyconflicts.pdf
https://web.archive.org/web/20201201202621/https://twitter.com/Susan_Hennessey/status/1333868824349855744
Durham has made abundantly clear that in a year and a half, he hasn't come up with anything. I guess this kind of partisan silliness has become characteristic of Barr's legacy, but unclear to me why Durham would want to go along with it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Einsatzgruppen
Einsatzgruppen (deployment groups / task forces) were Schutzstaffel (SS) paramilitary death squads of Nazi Germany that were responsible for mass killings, primarily by shooting, during World War II (1939–1945) in German-occupied Europe. The Einsatzgruppen had an integral role in the implementation of the so-called "Final Solution to the Jewish Question" in territories conquered by Nazi Germany, and were involved in the murder of much of the intelligentsia and cultural elite of Poland, including members of the Catholic priesthood. Almost all of the people they killed were civilians, beginning with the intelligentsia and swiftly progressing to Soviet political commissars, Jews, and Romani people, as well as actual or alleged partisans throughout Eastern Europe.
After the close of World War II, 24 senior leaders of the Einsatzgruppen were prosecuted in the Einsatzgruppen trial in 1947–48, charged with crimes against humanity and war crimes. Fourteen death sentences and two life sentences were handed out. Four additional Einsatzgruppe leaders were later tried and executed by other nations.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Einsatzgruppen_trial
>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Einsatzgruppen_trial
The Nuremberg Military Tribunal in its judgement stated the following:
[The facts] are so beyond the experience of normal man and the range of man-made phenomena that only the most complete judicial inquiry, and the most exhaustive trial, could verify and confirm them. Although the principal accusation is murder, … the charge of purposeful homicide in this case reaches such fantastic proportions and surpasses such credible limits that believability must be bolstered with assurance a hundred times repeated.
… a crime of such unprecedented brutality and of such inconceivable savagery that the mind rebels against its own thought image and the imagination staggers in the contemplation of a human degradation beyond the power of language to adequately portray.
The number of deaths resulting from the activities with which these defendants have been connected and which the prosecution has set at one million is but an abstract number. One cannot grasp the full cumulative terror of murder one million times repeated.
It is only when this grotesque total is broken down into units capable of mental assimilation that one can understand the monstrousness of the things we are in this trial contemplating. One must visualize not one million people but only ten persons – men, women, and children, perhaps all of one family – falling before the executioner's guns. If one million is divided by ten, this scene must happen one hundred thousand times, and as one visualizes the repetitious horror, one begins to understand the meaning of the prosecution's words, "It is with sorrow and with hope that we here disclose the deliberate slaughter of more than a million innocent and defenseless men, women, and children."
https://twitter.com/TBS_Canada/status/1422905173320642565
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/olympics/article-9873783/French-runner-Morhad-Amdouni-causes-HUGE-controversy-mens-marathon-knocking-bottles.html
https://twitter.com/bennysaint/status/1424245565458567169
Thoughts on Amdouni knocking over an entire row of water before taking the last one?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gianni_Infantino
no corona
https://twitter.com/AlbertBourla
Pfizer's CEO Wants to Go Shopping: 3 Potential Companies on His Radar
Speaking back in May on his company's Q1 2021 earnings call, (NYSE: PFE) CEO Albert Bourla stated, "You should expect to see a lot of … business development deals that will allow us to bring in-house a lot of potential medicines that could become [approved treatments] … in the second part of the decade." With pre-tax profit on its COVID-19 vaccine in the high 20% range and Bourla's company guiding for $78 billion to $80 billion in revenue for 2021 (with more than $33 billion of that coming from the vaccine), there's certainly money to be spent on acquisitions. Let's look at three potential candidates that could help Pfizer to further secure its future.
The budding oncology research machine
If Pfizer wants to fill its pipeline with precision-medicine oncology drugs for the next decade, perhaps it will consider Blueprint Medicines (NASDAQ: BPMC). This $5 billion biotech is the first and only company to have two internally discovered and developed medicines that received U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval within a decade of its founding.
Its first oncology drug, Gavreto, is a once-a-day oral medication for non-small cell lung cancer, as well as certain types of thyroid cancer with a mutation in a specific gene called RET. Altogether, these markets add up to about 6,000 patients annually in the U.S.
At a cost of $231,000 per patient per year, that's a $1.3 billion addressable market for which Blueprint and partner Roche will split costs and profits 50-50 in the U.S. While Gavreto competes with Eli Lilly's Retevmo in this market, the Roche-Blueprint product currently has a 40% share of the RET-inhibitor space, despite being the second one to the party.
The precision-medicine company also has two candidates entering phase 1 studies for non-small cell lung cancer with mutations within a specific gene called EGFR. AstraZeneca's Tagrisso, which has a similar target, hauled in a whopping $4.3 billion-plus in FY 2020.
While there is some tough competition out therrare, Blueprint has shown it can quickly bring drugs to market. With plenty of financial support and a large seasoned sales force already in place, Pfizer could rapidly capitalize on a buyout of this $5 billion business. And we haven't even mentioned Blueprint's other approved drug, which is for a rare disease called mastocytosis and has an addressable market in the U.S. of at least $800 million.
The safe rare-disease tuck-in
When Aurinia Pharmaceuticals' (NASDAQ: AUPH) Lupkynis was approved in January, it became the first oral therapy approved for lupus nephritis that doesn't require monitoring of drug levels. Lupus nephritis is an autoimmune disorder that's especially harsh on the kidneys, with approximately 10% to 30% of patients experiencing kidney failure within 15 years, despite current therapies.
This disease affects about 80,000 to 100,000 people in the U.S., but fortunately, when combined with current standards of care, Aurinia's drug is more likely to improve kidney function. In fact, 40.8% of patients see improvements in renal function after 52 treatments with Lupkynis, versus 22.5% receiving standard-of-care treatment alone.
The autoimmune-focused biotech expects an average annualized net revenue per patient of approximately $65,000. With at least 65,000 potential patients in the U.S., that's a total addressable market of more than $4 billion.
Even better, this doesn't even get into the potential for Lupkynis to treat other autoimmune diseases. Pfizer already has multiple compounds aimed at various autoimmune conditions, and this $1.8 billion company seems like an obvious tuck-in acquisition for the pharma giant. It has an approved drug with a blockbuster addressable market, and that drug may have optionality for other autoimmune conditions as well (though it's not actively being studied in other diseases at the moment).
The next frontier in COVID treatment
With COVID-19 cases rising worldwide, there's a pressing need for an efficacious oral therapy that can be administered not only to hospitalized patients but also to those well enough to be given a prescription as outpatients. Pharma Atea Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: AVIR) reported interim phase 2 results at the end of June showing that its lead COVID-19 oral treatment, AT-527, could rapidly reduce the viral load in COVID-19 patients.
After two days of treatment, patients experienced an 80% greater viral-load reduction compared to placebo and this difference was maintained eight days after the start of treatment. Atea partnered with Roche in October 2020 on AT-527, and the drug is now in an ongoing worldwide phase 3 trial with results due in the second half of 2021. After its raging success with BioNTech on their coronavirus vaccine, Pfizer may be willing to double down on partnerships in the COVID-19 space especially with Bourla's company raising its 2021 sales forecast of its partnered COVID-19 vaccine to $33.5 billion for the year.
With Atea valued at just $2.1 billion yet having megablockbuster potential, there's a lot of upside for Pfizer. An Atea buyout also would provide a safety net should Pfizer's own oral combination therapy for COVID, which just entered phase 2/3 trials, fizzle out.
If I were Albert Bourla, which would I choose? On July 22, Pfizer announced a global collaboration with Arvinas, which has a breast cancer treatment in phase 2 trials. The deal cost Pfizer $650 million upfront, as well as a $350 million equity investment and up to $1.4 billion in milestone payments. Given this, the behemoth may not be looking for another oncology company right away. And despite impressive COVID-19 data from Atea, Pfizer has its own oral coronavirus treatment early in progress, though not quite as far along in clinical trials.
That leaves Aurinia, which I believe to be the safest buy on the list for pharmaceutical investors – Pfizer included. With a market cap of less than $2 billion and a potential blockbuster that has possible optionality into other autoimmune diseases, Aurinia looks undervalued and could find itself being acquired sooner rather than later.
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https://outline.com/svcHKz
https://twitter.com/inthebubblepod/status/1420718316251926529
With the Delta variant on all of our minds, @ASlavitt meets with @pfizer CEO @AlbertBourla to discuss how our vaccines measure up to the threat. Is a third shot on the horizon?
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/fauci-on-covid-drugs-vaccines-and-getting-back-to-normal1/
https://outline.com/FCv83X
Fauci on COVID Drugs, Vaccines and Getting Back to Normal
COVID cases are surging again in much of the U.S. as the Delta variant takes hold among unvaccinated populations. Antiviral pills given early in the course of infection to prevent severe COVID symptoms and hospitalizations are still lacking, but a new Biden administration effort hopes to change that. The Antiviral Program for Pandemics (APP) is spending more than $3 billion to support research on drugs not just for coronaviruses but also for other viruses with pandemic potential.
Scientific American spoke with Anthony Fauci, long-time director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and chief medical adviser to President Joe Biden, about his hopes for the APP, the government’s ongoing efforts to boost immunizations in areas with low vaccination rates and what keeps him up at night.
[An edited transcript of the interview follows.]
<What are the goals of the Antiviral Program for Pandemics?
There are two components to the program: accelerating clinical testing of promising antivirals that are already in various stages of the development pipeline and expanding the basic science and knowledge needed to discover new antiviral medicines. The primary mover is COVID. But if the APP is successful—and I believe it will be—then it can be directed at any virus of pandemic potential. It will require us to develop the sorts of strong public-private partnerships that allowed us to successfully develop antivirals for HIV and hepatitis C. The important thing to remember is that if you can block an acute viral pathogen in the early stage of infection, then you can avoid progression to the advanced stage of disease.
<Can you say anything about which drugs are being considered now?
There are a few drugs that are out there. For instance, a protease inhibitor from Pfizer [currently known as PF-07321332], a drug called molnupiravir from Merck and a drug from Atea Pharmaceuticals [AT-527]. The purpose of the APP is to develop a more robust pipeline.
<COVID antivirals work most effectively during the first week or so of infection. Doesn’t that create logistic hurdles for treatment?
That is absolutely correct. You have to give the drugs quickly, during the acute stage of disease, which is a different paradigm than how we treat HIV and hepatitis C, which are both chronic infections. The seven-day window might be a bit more challenging from a strategic standpoint. That is why we are also developing specific and sensitive COVID diagnostic tests, so you know what you’re dealing with and can then quickly and effectively treat people.
<What about variants such as Delta? Could they make the drugs less effective over time?
Obviously you have to be concerned that variants might be problematic for antivirals, just as they [may be] for vaccines and monoclonal antibodies. But what we’re aiming at with these drugs are also components of the virus that are critical for replication, which may not be subverted by variants. This is also why we need more than a single drug—which is the same approach we used with HIV when one drug ultimately turned out not to be as effective as multiple drugs in combination. Moreover, as you correctly pointed out, viruses of pandemic potential usually cause acute infections. And because you only need to treat people for relatively short durations, the induction of mutations that would limit the effects of the drugs might not be as likely as when you’re treating people for literally an entire lifetime.
<The Biden administration fell short of its goal to at least partially vaccinate 70 percent of the U.S. population by July 4. What can be done about vaccine refusal—a major roadblock to achieving herd immunity?
Even though our [vaccination goal] wasn’t reached, we never intended to stop pushing to get more people vaccinated well beyond the Fourth. So, we're doing everything we can to make vaccines easily available and make sure that people—especially young people—are listening to trusted messengers. We’re working with local community leaders, and we have the COVID-19 Community Corps initiative. We have mobile units for ease of vaccination. We’re doing our very best to get people who haven’t been vaccinated to seriously consider how important it is for themselves, the safety of their families and their community responsibility to put an end to this pandemic. And the way you put an end to this pandemic is by getting as many people vaccinated as possible.
<What are you watching out for as society opens up and people try to get back to normal life?
We need to do good surveillance to make sure that we’re not having blips of infection, particularly in the states, cities and counties with low vaccination rates. We have the tools now to effectively suppress the spread of SARS-CoV-2 in this country. And unfortunately, there’s a degree of disparity in the willingness of people in different parts of the country to get vaccinated. And so we have to watch for regional surges in these areas.
<Are you getting enough sleep these days?
No [laughs]! Unfortunately, I’m not.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR(S)
Charles Schmidt is a freelance journalist based in Portland, Me., covering health and the environment. He has written for Scientific American about therapeutic viruses that can infect harmful bacteria and about dangerous contaminants in drinking water.
>Atea partnered with Roche in October 2020 on AT-527, and the drug is now in an ongoing worldwide phase 3 trial with results due in the second half of 2021.
>For instance, a protease inhibitor from Pfizer [currently known as PF-07321332], a drug called molnupiravir from Merck and a drug from Atea Pharmaceuticals [AT-527].
https://www.dcchemicals.com/product_show-AT-527.html
AT-527, a hemisulfate salt of AT-511, a guanosine nucleotide prodrug, is a potent and orally active HCV viral replication inhibitor. AT-527 is highly effective in the control of SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19) infection in vitro (EC90=0.47 μM). AT-527 has pangenotypic antiviral activity[1][2][3].AT-511 has pan-genotypic antiviral activities that inhibits HCV genotype 1a (HCV GT1a), HCV GT1b, HCV GT2a, HCV GT3a, HCV GT4a, and HCV GT5a replication with EC50 values of 12.8 nM, 12.5 nM, 9.2 nM, 10.3 nM, 14.7 nM, and 28.5 nM, respectively[1]. In normal human airway epithelial cells, the concentration of AT-511 required to inhibit replication of SARS-CoV-2 by EC90 is 0.47 μM, very similar to its EC90 against HCoV-229E, HCoV-OC43 and SARS-CoV in Huh-7 cells[2].
jackpot
>https://www.dcchemicals.com/product_show-AT-527.html
is AT-527 simply Hydroxychloroquine?
https://twitter.com/AlbertBourla/status/1420460281239457801
As the virus continues to evolve, and the pandemic persists in many places, we are sharing an update to our safety and efficacy results from the Pfizer-BioNTech Phase 3 study of our #COVID19 vaccine through up to 6 months:
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.28.21261159v1
Six Month Safety and Efficacy of the BNT162b2 mRNA COVID-19 Vaccine