New Coronavirus Cases in Greece on Steady Downward Trend

Greece recorded 519 new cases of the coronavirus on Thursday, which marks 30 fewer instances of the virus than the 549 cases that had been recorded on Wednesday.

Just two of Thursday’s total cases were identified during routine Covid-19 testing of tourists at the country’s borders.

Currently, there are 321 patients with the coronavirus on ventilators in Greece, which is nine fewer than the number of patients undergoing the invasive treatment in the country yesterday, Wednesday.

Tragically, 16 people suffering from the coronavirus passed away in the country over the past 24-hour period, which represents three more than those who died with the virus on Wednesday.

214 cases of coronavirus diagnosed in Attica alone; 44 in Thessaloniki

Of the 519 new coronavirus cases recorded in Greece in the past 24 hours, 214 were located in Attica, home to the Greek capital city of Athens.

In the center of Athens, a total of 109 cases of Covid-19 were identified Thursday.

Tests showed that in Thessaloniki, Greece’s second-largest city, a total of 44 cases of Covid-19 had been diagnosed in the last 24 hours.

New coronavirus vaccine “Novavax” up to 90% effective

A new coronavirus vaccine called Novavax, from a company by the same name, has proven to be 90% effective in trials, according to its maker.

The new vaccine candidate appears on the horizon just as inoculations have slowed in the United States, where more than 44% of citizens are now fully vaccinated, but when other regions of the world variants of concern are posing an ever greater problem.

The latest study undertaken by the Novavax firm, headquartered in Gaithersburg, Maryland, trialed the candidate in the United States as well as Mexico. Earlier studies had been undertaken in Great Britain and in South Africa.

The two-inoculation vaccine proved to be approximately 90% effective overall, and according to the company, the preliminary data so far shows that the shot is safe. The effectiveness figures coming out of the study are parallel to those demonstrated by both the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines in their studies.

Now, the United States has more than enough vaccines to meet the slumping demand, and the need for inoculations is desperate in some regions of the world, including Africa, which is referred to now as a “vaccine desert,” in which barely 1% of the people are fully inoculated.

The Novavax vaccine, unlike the Pfizer/BioNTech shot which hit the market first, is very easy to transport and store, offering increased hope to far-flung nations which will be the target for a great many of the doses manufactured as soon as their emergency use is authorized. It can be stored for some time at normal refrigerator temperatures.

However, the next few months hold only more waiting for the vaccine candidate as the company ramps up over the Summer and plans to put the shot before the US Food and Drug Administration and the European Medicines Agency for emergency approval in September.