by DrKSSMDPhD | November 19, 2015 6:52 pm
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Well, I whiffed that one, so much for my memory,
wish I could have a toddy. First time I’ve said that in years.
NOVAVAX (NVAX) …..another so called vaccine company for Ebola…however The Gates foundation are involved. As the going says, Whatever Bill Gates touches, it turns into “GOLD”. What do you think? Is this the next Flu Virus Vaccine success company? Pharmaceutical companies unfortunately profit off those who are brain washed by the media and so forth that it permeates into all aspects of our past, current ,and future lifestyles.
But we little people need to make money too unfortunately.
Vaccine companies tend not to pass on jingle to their investors. That’s my estimation after pulling charts on what few exist and studying their history. I DO think of the vaccine makers NovaVax is a fine one, but I see no real money to be made in Ebola vaccine. Vaccinating entire nations and regions in Africa is logistically impossible.
My sole personal investment in a vaccine maker in Agenus $AGEN, which I consider technologically “hot,” best of breed. Now is not an unreasonable buying opp because price is battered down, but this is not a recommendation that you buy it. Certainly study it if you are interested in investing in vax makers.
The whole Ebola thing has be very much confused.
Why did it stop.
How did they stop it.
How did it start.
Why didn’t it spread.
I am not saying anything regarding conspiracy theories I am asking that it just seems very odd that they were able to bring such a thing under control. You would think a true “Outbreak” would spread, no? Maybe not all over the world but at least throughout Africa. Though I likely think this from watching movies as I have no real understanding of true pandemics.
I can start an answer. Good questions and a fascinating topic. But it’s not odd at all! The very short, over-simplified answer is that the chain of transmission of the virus from person to person was largely interrupted through a host of measures, including identification and isolation of persons infected with the virus or showing symptoms of it, rigorous infection control measures among persons treating them, and education of people in affected countries about how they could avoid exposure. For instance, in the case of Ebola, avoiding one major method of exposure required changing common burial practices so that there was no direct handling of the bodies of persons that Ebola killed. These are standard infectious disease control measures that have wide applicability and are frequently used in smaller outbreaks of disease. Also, viruses can mutate and their behavior change. I am not qualified to comment on the virological aspects of Ebola, though CDC reports that the genetic changes observed in the virus of the 2014 outbreak did not appear to affect the severity or transmissibility of disease.
There is much information available on the enormous international effort involved in curbing the Ebola outbreak and saving the lives of its victims (including comment on what is still not known about the virus and how it behaves) at the WHO and CDC websites. LInks appear below, but the following paragraph from WHO’s Nov 18, 2015 situation report briefly sums up the Ebola response and its current status (which continues; it’s just not something that makes the headlines).
“28 598 confirmed, probable, and suspected cases have been reported in Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone, with 11 299 deaths (table 1; figure 2) since the onset of the Ebola outbreak. The majority of these cases and deaths were reported between August and December 2014, after which case incidence began to decline as a result of the rapid scale-up of treatment, isolation, and safe burial capacity in the three countries. This rapid scale-up operation was known as phase 1 of the response, and was built on in the early first half of 2015 by a period of continuous refinement to surveillance, contact tracing, and community engagement interventions. This period, termed phase 2, succeeded in driving case incidence to 5 cases or fewer per week by the end of July. This marked fall in case incidence signalled a transition to a distinct third phase of the epidemic. This third phase is characterised by limited transmission across small geographical areas, combined with a low probability of high consequence incidents of re-emergence of EVD from reservoirs of viral persistence. In order to effectively interrupt remaining transmission chains and manage the residual risks posed by viral persistence, WHO, as lead agency within the Interagency Collaboration on Ebola and in coordination with national and international partners, designed the phase 3 Ebola response framework. The phase 3 response framework builds on the foundations of phase 1 and phase 2 to incorporate new developments in Ebola control, from vaccines and rapid-response teams to counselling and welfare services for survivors.” The full status report is at http://apps.who.int/ebola/current-situation/ebola-situation-report-18-november-2015
More information on all aspects of the Ebola outbreak and response can be found at the WHO and CDC Ebola websites. http://www.who.int/csr/disease/ebola/en/.
http://www.cdc.gov/vhf/ebola/index.html
Thank you but I am not an easy believer.
Something is fishy IMO.
No matter what God bless all the people who went there and risked their lives to help people. Those people are all heroes in my book. True heroes!
I am not sure why you mean by fishy, dcohn, but ebola does seem to have reappeared.
http://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2015/11/25/ebola-returns-to-liberia-two-dead-hundreds-under-surveillance/
CBYL. Doc said to go to the Manchurian thread but no one seems to be paying heed, so I’ll post here. Question for Glenn.Way back in September you noted that CBYL was way undervalued. Since then, mainly recently, it has been hampered with no negative news that i can find. Is it an even better buying opportunity now? Or should we wait for Phase 3 results in January?
Hi Tom…not to steal Glenn’s thunder, I just saw your comment awaiting moderation. $CBYL has swooned and stayed down because that is what every smallcap early-stage biotech has done since biotech fundamentals broke down in the summer and fell 30 percent in the autumn. $CBYL has followed suit with its peers. I can’t give you trading advice. I have a long position in $CBYL and view it as undervalued here, but until biotech malaise has abated, I cannot guarantee that good phase 3 data would cause shares to rise. I do expect good data from and for $CBYL.
CBYL: Looking at the charts; I think this looks a good time to take a nibble….perhaps 3.34 would be better, if it gets there.
Celladon $CLDN http://www.marketwatch.com/story/eiger-biopharmaceuticals-and-celladon-corporation-sign-merger-agreement-2015-11-18?siteid=bigcharts&dist=bigcharts
Comeback?
2 years ago, I would not have been able to answer and or comprehend a single question. Today I tested cold and received 50% w/o the assistance of Google. To me, as a dumb grunt, that is 100% improvement!
Many thanks Dr KSS. You truly care about your pupils and we are forever hooked to your every word. Thanks for all you do.
I must also agree that there is no question the doc has us learning.
I also hit 50% and I knew none of those details except from here.
Thank you Doc!
Ok, I’m finally all submitted….my brain hurts.
Well said D Brown. Ebola has horrible symptoms and is easily spread, and there’s much not known about it. But there is effective treatment and the means to interrupt it are well known. The tiny, impoverished nation of Liberia, working with the WHO, got it under control. It’s not something out of a Stephen King novel.
The excited media reports from last year around this time, and the ignorant statements and actions of a very few officials (looking at your Gov Chris Christie) made people think that it would burn out of control when that was not the case at all. The hospital in Houston made some serious mistakes and hopefully everyone learned from them, but as you may have noticed, the ONLY person to die of Ebola in the US was the poor guy who arrived with it, undiagnosed. And the only two people who were infected with Ebola in the US were two nurses who treated him, improperly protected.
Funny how the people who were crying ‘wolf’ the loudest at the time have not stepped up to say, ‘Maybe I got it wrong.’
(Sorry, that was supposed to nest under comment #23.)
Anamorph – thanks. Agree in nearly all respects. However, I believe it is also important not to overstate the effectiveness of Ebola treatment. In the U.S., obviously, it was 100%, but those treated were young and otherwise healthy. Although the survival rates of victims in Sierra Leone have recently been reported to be 70%, a big improvement over past outbreaks, that still translates to a mortality rate of 30%. And we don’t understand yet the long-term impacts on survivors. The way I’d put it — if you ever contracted Ebola, it’s still a damned scary disease. The point, as you said, is that we know what to do to prevent you from getting it and it’s proven that we can do it. In researching my response , I noted that vaccine trials are underway in West Africa and other places. I can only imagine the response from investors if the disease should resurge or emerge elsewhere. Status of vaccine trials and other Ebola diagnosis and drug development work summarized here: http://www.who.int/medicines/emp_ebola_q_as/en/
Now I apologize for taking up all this space on an unrelated thread, but did so only because the original question appeared here.
Glad to have scored 54%. Last year I would have scored 20% 🙂 . Thanks Doc.
This thread has been closed and the biotech discussions with Dr. KSS have moved to his new article. Dr. KSS’s most recent article can always be found on his author page here
This thread has been closed and the biotech discussions with Dr. KSS have moved to his new article. Dr. KSS’s most recent article can always be found on his author page here