Health News Roundup: Sanofi arthritis reduce death rates among COVID-19 patients; UK extends England entry ban to travelers from 11 African countries for COVID variant

Roche, Sanofi arthritis drugs reduce death rates among sickest COVID-19 patients Treating critically ill COVID-19 patients with Roche's Actemra or Sanofi's Kevzara arthritis drugs significantly improves survival rates and reduces the amount of time patients need intensive care, study results showed on Thursday.

Moderna's COVID-19 mRNA vaccine is likely to offer protection of up to a couple of years, its chief executive said on Thursday, even though more data is still needed to make a definitive assessment. The U.S. biotech company, which stunned the world last year by coming up with a vaccine against the disease caused by the new coronavirus in just a few weeks, received approval for its shot from the European Commission on Wednesday.

Roche, Sanofi arthritis drugs reduce death rates among sickest COVID-19 patients

Treating critically ill COVID-19 patients with Roche's Actemra or Sanofi's Kevzara arthritis drugs significantly improves survival rates and reduces the amount of time patients need intensive care, study results showed on Thursday. The findings, which have not yet been peer-reviewed, showed that the immunosuppressive drugs - Actemra, also known as tocilizumab, and Kevzara, also known as sarilumab - reduced death rates by 8.5 percentage points among patients hospitalised and severely ill with the pandemic disease.

UK extends England entry ban to travelers from 11 African countries for COVID variant

The United Kingdom said on Thursday it would extend a ban on travelers entering England to southern African countries in a measure to prevent the spread of a new COVID-19 variant identified in South Africa. The restriction will go into effect on Saturday and remain in place for two weeks, the government said in a statement https://bit.ly/3pTvmsk.