Your Weekly Covid Speed Round

💉 The FDA gave full approval to Moderna’s vaccine for use in adults 18+, making it the second fully approved shot after Pfizer/BioNTech. Going forward, Moderna’s two-dose vaccine will be marketed as Spikevax. Here’s a quick recap of other virus-related news:

• Case counts and hospitalizations continue to decrease across the US, according to the latest data, though daily deaths remain above previous delta peaks.
• The 7-day moving average of hospitalizations has fallen for the past ~10 days and dropped below 144,000 on Sunday for the first time in nearly three weeks. The 7-day moving average of deaths fell slightly over the weekend to 2,265.
• Novavax, a Maryland-based biotech company, asked the FDA for emergency use authorization of its vaccine yesterday. Its two-dose version, which has been approved by the WHO and several countries, uses a more traditional protein-based technology compared with other authorized vaccines in the US.
• In a study published in the journal Cell, scientists identified four risk factors as potentially making someone at greater risk of developing long Covid, including Type 2 diabetes and reactivated Epstein-Barr virus.
• The CDC raised travel advisories to their highest levels for a dozen countries on Monday due to recent spikes in cases.

+Omicron 2.0 or just fearmongering?... A Danish study identified a new omicron subvariant that has rapidly become dominant in Denmark and is reportedly more contagious but less likely to be spread by vaccinated people.