1302 10 DECEMBER 2021 • VOL 374 ISSUE 6573 science.org SCIENCEIMAGE: MIA ROSENFELD AND FIONA KEARNS/AMARO LAB/UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGOof the Omicron variant, according to
results from Vir Biotechnology.
The company, which developed the drug
with GlaxoSmithKline, this week added
the latest data to a 1 December preprint
reporting that the antibody maintains
potent neutralizing activity against pseudo-
viruses with individual Omicron spike
mutations. The drug, called sotrovimab,
was authorized by the United States in
May and by the United Kingdom last
week. EU regulators are still evaluating
it. The antibody, delivered by intrave-
nous infusion, is for nonhospitalized
people with mild to moderate COVID-
symptoms. Regeneron said last week
its COVID-19 mAb cocktail (casirivimab
and imdevimab) may lose some potency
against the Omicron variant, and it is
conducting lab studies to confirm that.
Separately this week, the World Health
Organization advised against use of
antibody-filled plasma from recovered
COVID-19 patients as a therapy, saying it
does not improve survival.Abortion case hears little science
LAW | Science and medicine barely
played a role in last week’s oral arguments
for a potentially landmark U.S. Supreme
Court case, although fetal viability was
mentioned often and several groups had
filed amicus briefs summarizing relevant
research results. The justices are reviewing
the constitutionality of a Mississippi law
that bans most abortions after 15 weeks
of pregnancy. Previous Supreme Court
cases had established that abortions could
not be banned if the fetus couldn’t yet
survive outside the womb, a thresholdNEWS
“
In essence, this campaign was a hall of mirrors,
endlessly reflecting a single fake persona.
”
From a report by Meta (formerly Facebook) finding that Chinese entities created
a phony Swiss biologist on social media and amplified his claims that the United States
was intimidating the World Health Organization on COVID-19’s origin.T
he United States is the world’s largest generator of plastic
waste and among the top dozen sources of plastic pollution
in the ocean, yet it lacks comprehensive strategies to study
or reduce the problem, reports a panel convened by the U.S.
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.
The country produced 42 million tons of plastic waste in 2016,
with as much as 2 million tons of that winding up in the ocean, the
report released last week notes. That’s roughly one-quarter of the
estimated global total dumped into the ocean each year. Currently,
recycling in the United States is “grossly insufficient” to tackle the
problem, the panel warns. The group calls for developing a nation-
wide research strategy by the end of 2022 to better understand the
size and drivers of the plastics problem. It also urged greater U.S.
measures to cut plastic waste, pointing to initiatives in other coun-
tries, such as restricting free plastic bags and requiring manufac-
turers to take back packaging.IN BRIEF
Edited by John TravisENVIRONMENTCall for U.S. to address plastic waste
Bringing equity to AI
DIVERSITY | Computer scientist Timnit
Gebru, whose research showed facial recog-
nition software has a bias against women
and people of color, announced last week
she’s launching the Distributed Artificial
Intelligence Research Institute (DAIR). The
nonprofit institute will develop artificial
intelligence software serving marginalized
groups and aims “to counter Big Tech’s
pervasive influence on the research, devel-
opment and deployment of AI,” according
to a statement. In an early project, DAIR
researchers will create a public data set
of aerial images to study how apartheid
shaped land use in South Africa. Gebru
co-led Google’s Ethical AI group until last
year, when she clashed with the Silicon
Valley giant over a paper she co-authored
raising concerns about potential harm
from language-processing technology used
by Google and other companies. (Gebru
says she was fired, although Google calledher departure a resignation.) DAIR will
kick off with $3.7 million in funding from
multiple foundations and other groups.An antibody for Omicron?
COVID 19 | A monoclonal antibody (mAb)
authorized this year for COVID-19 neutral-
izes pseudoviruses equipped with all 37 of
the mutations in the spike surface proteinOriginal spike Delta spike Omicron spikeA visualization of mutations (blue, red, and white) that distinguish the Omicron spike protein from those of the
original SARS-CoV-2 pandemic coronavirus and the Delta variant.