Member Info for HotblackDesiato

Hi WIP - 0.29p? Aye, that's it, rub it in. I just missed out on the sub 1p club (was thwarted by a weekend between deciding 'yes' and buying in) but I can't complain. Just a pity I've averaged up since then!

Also not sure what pressure could be put on the Patent Office to speed things up - it's not a new type of mousetrap we're dealing with here, it's a potentially life saving drug so there can't be any shortcuts or death my result...much like a new type of mousetrap ;-)

Del - the only thing we know for sure is the details of the patent application are no longer a secret after 18mths. Not too long to wait now to confirm if SOG's thinking is correct re the contents.

You never know, it could be granted next week and the sp scoots up to Thoth's next target of 17p before the end of July.

It'd certainly be handy if it did hit 17p next week as I need new socks.

RNS stated a HNW individual therefore it's a single person, otherwise the RNS would say an investment trust (or whatever).

DP64 - if this all pays off I'll buy Britannia and moor it next to Thoth's yacht.

Hi Basser, the article didn't cover long term effects of flu but it did say this on it -

Winter usually means outbreaks of respiratory viruses including influenza, respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) and those that cause common colds. They barely touched us last winter, suppressed by measures to limit the spread of covid-19. But what about after restrictions are lifted?

Making global predictions is almost impossible, says Azra Ghani at Imperial College London. “Every country is almost unique,” she says. But the UK at least can probably expect a worse-thanusual flu season, according to a new report from the Academy of Medical Sciences.

There are still multiple unknowns, including how bad this winter’s flu strain will be, how effective the flu vaccine is and how much natural immunity has waned. But the UK can expect 1.5 to 2.2 times the normal number of flu cases, says Ghani, a member of the report’s expert advisory group. Flu normally kills 10,000 to 30,000 people a year in England.

RSV is also expected to be up to twice as prevalent than it is in a normal year, which sees 20,000 children under 5 admitted to hospital. The vast majority recover.

There is also the added risk of co-infection, which is when an individual is infected with two or more viruses at the same time, including the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes covid-19. “Co-infection is quite common in the winter months – some people can harbour three at the same time – and there is evidence that RSV can make covid-19 symptoms quite a lot worse,” says Stephen Holgate at the University of Southampton, UK, the report’s chair.

This all points to a bleak midwinter in England. “The NHS is already under pressure, so is likely not to be able to cope with these challenges,” he says.

So there you have it, a bleak midwinter predicted for England. Glad I'm in Scotland :-)

Meh, the BBC are a bit slow off the mark here. I posted details of the US funding research back on 08 Jun 2021 (18:09 post if anyone wants a read).

Part 3 of 3 - New Scientist article 24/7/21 :

The covid-19 pandemic will one day be history, but the virus that caused it will not. Just as the 1918 influenza virus is still with us, we will have to learn to live with SARS-CoV-2 and its descendants, says Neil Ferguson at Imperial College London. But what form that relationship will take is unknown.

According to Amalio Telenti at Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California, we are currently in a transition period as vaccines wrestle the pandemic under control. After this, he says, we won’t eliminate the virus, but it will become endemic, meaning it is a constant presence that ebbs and flows over years or decades.

Once this happens, broadly speaking there are three scenarios, he says. The worst case is a future with waves of severe disease like the deadly flu outbreaks of 1928-29 and 1934-36, both of which were caused by descendants of the 1918-19 flu virus. This scenario could occur if global vaccination rates remain too low, immunity doesn’t persist or the virus mutates so it can evade the immune response or becomes more virulent.

The second and most likely scenario, he says, is that SARS-CoV-2 turns into a seasonal virus like flu. But that would still mean intermittent epidemic peaks, as with flu.

The best-case scenario is that the virus fades to become just another seasonal coronavirus like the four that cause the common cold.

Ferguson agrees that the middle scenario is more likely, with low levels of infection and flare-ups where levels of immunity decline. “It will become a classic endemic respiratory disease which we manage, probably through vaccination,” he says.

But that wouldn’t entail any return to pandemic restrictions, says Graham Medley at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine. “We don’t put special measures in to deal with the flu and in the same way I don’t think we’ll have special measures in to deal with the coronavirus.”

Part 2 of 3 - New Scientist article 24/7/21

People who are sick enough to be in hospital may already receive medicines, such as the steroid dexamethasone, and an artificial antibody, tocilizumab, both of which dampen the unhelpful overreaction to the virus by the immune system. But the search is on for treatments that people with milder illness could use at home.

Any drug that works as a treatment could also make a preventative medicine, says Philip Bath at the University of Nottingham. Preventative drugs could be taken by vulnerable people who have been in contact with known cases, or if infection rates surge locally. Bath is about to start a trial of two possible preventatives in care homes.

Other trials have already started. Antiviral drugs work by blocking the virus’s life cycle. In April, the UK set up an Antivirals Taskforce that aims to have at least two such medicines ready for home use by the end of this year. This month, one leading contender, called molnupiravir, was found to reduce hospital admissions in people with mild covid-19 in India.

Some medicines used to treat other illnesses have been rushed into covid-19 trials. Several are being investigated that raise nitric oxide levels, which dilates the airways and blood vessels to make breathing easier. In a different approach, a compound from seaweed which is sprayed up the nose works by coating the nasal passages to block virus entry. A trial in Argentina found it cut the number of intensive care staff who caught the virus by 80 per cent.

More innovative approaches are at an earlier stage of development. One is tiny fragments of antibodies that can be inhaled, called nanobodies. These “decoy particles” are covered with ACE2, the molecule on human cells the virus normally binds to.

Part 1 of 3 - New Scientist article 24/7/21 :

As covid-19 is allowed to spread freely, many more people will end up with long covid. Just how many is impossible to predict, however.

There are widely differing estimates of how many infected people get long covid. When Nina Langeland at the University of Bergen and her colleagues followed 250 or so people in Norway who tested positive for covid-19 but didn’t need to go to hospital, the team found half of those aged between 16 and 30 years still had symptoms six months later, ranging from loss of taste and smell to fatigue and memory problems.

“I do see our findings as a good reason to immunise teenagers,” says Langeland, “to avoid longterm symptoms, which could affect education and studying.”

By contrast, Tim Spector at King’s College London and his colleagues estimate that just 1 in 100 people aged around 20 have long covid after three months. Much of the reason for these differences is due to how long covid is defined, says Spector, with some studies counting any lasting symptom, however minor.

“We’ve redefined it to say it’s a symptom that persists for more than 12 weeks that interferes with your normal functioning or activities,” he says. His team estimates that 180,000 people in the UK have or have had long covid according to this definition, and this number is currently growing by 700 each day.

What is clear from his research is that vaccination greatly reduces the risk of getting long covid. “It’s maybe a twentieth of what it would have been,” says Spector. This is mostly because vaccination reduces the risk of being infected in the first place, but his team’s findings suggest that the risk is also halved in those who get infected despite being vaccinated.

Hi RMM, running out of bottled water? I guess certain burghs of London will resort to loud tutting when shipments of quinoa are also hit.

I was surprised by a bit from the BBC's report on the story here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57924264

Specifically the line, 'The Co-op said items such as soft drinks, personal care products such as deodorant and beer were worst affected.'

So there you have it, beer is considered a personal care product. Knew it all along.

Have a powerful weekend folks.

Hotblack.

Hi Aber - sorry, my post was a longwinded version of your own (I was typing it as you posted) - great minds think alike!

Thoth et al,

With reference to the takeover panel code, it states:

"When a person or group acquires interests in shares carrying 30% or more of the voting rights of a company, they must make a cash offer to all other shareholders at the highest price paid in the 12 months before the offer was announced (30% of the voting rights of a company is treated by the Code as the level at which effective control is obtained)."

also

"When interests in shares carrying 10% or more of the voting rights of a class have been acquired by an offeror (i.e. a bidder) in the offer period and the previous 12 months, the offer must include a cash alternative for all shareholders of that class at the highest price paid by the offeror in that period. Further, if an offeror acquires for cash any interest in shares during the offer period, a cash alternative must be made available at that price at least."

The bit that concerned me is the '...at the highest price paid in the 12mths before the offer...'.

Just speculating here, but if either of our HNW chums (or both if they join forces) are looking to pull a flanker to takeover the company might we be in danger of being bought out 'on the cheap'? Perhaps I'm over-thinking it but I was reading about hostile takeovers and proxy fights (https://www.investopedia.com/terms/p/proxyfight.asp) as we wouldn't want to see SAR stolen from under our noses. Hopefully a lowball offer would be roundly rejected but who knows?

We're probably still some way off from any takeover bid but being forewarned is forearmed and all that jazz.

Please tell me if I'm thinking absolute toot.

Regards,

Hotblack.

I think the take-home message from all of this is we have options. The thing about HNW individuals is they network, they speak with others which in turn opens doors for those they invest in.

What the RNS tells naysayers is we are amassing the funds and contacts to take our compounds further down the road than we otherwise could. We can be more selective in who we partner with.

Good times ahead.

I've just heard on the wireless that yacht brokers are now monitoring our sp. Not sure why :-)

Ha!

Hi all,

The RNS notes, '...to advance SDC-1801 into clinical development in autoimmune diseases, including the immune overreaction to Covid-19 and other viral infections...' - anyone think this may mean we're not going the AGILE route?

As some have speculated, if our compound failed within AGILE that might mean a major setback for other uses therefore it may be better not to involve the government programme. Any thoughts?

Hotblack.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/jul/18/boris-johnson-and-rishi-sunak-will-not-isolate-after-being-pinged-says-no-10

Hi Cobalt,

Is there a reason why we are not on the list of studies? I imagine the simplest answer would be we are on a list of studies, just not the one you looked at. Our recent study relates to a grant awarded to Sareum through the Innovate UK Sustainable Innovation Fund for projects that address and mitigate the health, social, cultural and environmental impacts of the Covid-19 outbreak.

AGILE is not the ultimate goal, it is only one possibility. The 1/7/21 RNS states (with regard to funding & progress), "...this could include the UK government's AGILE clinical development platform, which was established to fund Phase 1 trials and fast-track the development of potentially ground-breaking Covid-19 treatments. These activities are expected to run in parallel with the broader SDC-1801 development plan targeting autoimmune diseases. We look forward to providing updates on our progress as we reach key milestones in the development of SDC-1801.

What I'd infer from all of this is we have options. As Tarantino might say, 'we all just need to chill the **** out and be like little Fonzies'.

Regards,

Hotblack.

We just have to get used to it. In the 19th century the UK led the world. In the 20th century it was the US. China will be the global leader in the 21st. Wasn't it just a couple of years ago that the Chinese premier declared greed is good? You can either learn to deal with a wealthy and powerful nation or pretend they don't exist.