2021-04-17 General

Vaccines

Buried in this article about Moderna signing a contract with Rovi, a Spanish company, to make ingredients for their vax is something that mentions that Lonza (Moderna’s primary subcontractor) has two manufacturing lines that it expects to become operational in the next few weeks. Currently, only one line is operational.

Tripling the Moderna output would be very very helpful, and would help Moderna deliver the EIGHT MILLION they are supposed to get to Canada this quarter.

It is also not clear to me what “ingredients” Rovi is going to make. Maybe it means like “ethanol” or “lipid nanoparticles”, maybe it means “mRNA”. If it is the latter, that would be awesome. Maybe we could have four manufacturing lines instead of one!

Transmission

I have read, over and over again, that outdoor activities are extremely safe, and that there had been no superspreader events outdoors. Well, there is now an example: 40 people in Saskatchewan got COVID at an outdoor party.