As discussed on TWiV yesterday, B.1.1.7 isn't a "strain," which has demonstrably different biological properties, but is still considered a "variant."<p><a href="https://www.microbe.tv/twiv/twiv-697/" rel="nofollow">https://www.microbe.tv/twiv/twiv-697/</a><p>Any biological differences are theorized solely from the genome at this point. In the episode, Racaniello is at pains to point out that genomic differences alone don't imply biological differences in say transmission, and things like founder effects might also explain the variant's prevalance. We simply don't know yet.<p>There's a neat cautionary example at 35:10 which I'll try to summarize here. Polio was endemic, with low incidence, for thousands of years. Around 1900 it went from endemic to epidemic. Why? Did it suddenly mutate into a deadlier or more transmissable strain? While we don't have polio sequences from before and after 1900 to compare, we do know that rapid improvements in sanitation delayed exposure to the polio virus. Babies were now encountering the virus after maternal antibodies to it had waned! And it turns out this adequately explains the spike in polio a century ago.<p>Goes to show how complex the dynamics of these systems can be!
> <i>The people who tested positive with the new strain, which is said to spread more easily and was blamed for a recent spike in infections in the U.K., returned to Japan this month — two at Tokyo's Haneda airport and and three at Kansai International Airport in Osaka.</i><p>This is talking about the SARS-CoV-2 VOC 202012/01 variant [0], aka B.1.1.7., aka carrying the N501Y mutation.<p>No news here, other than confirmed spread to Japan.<p>[0] <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/more/scientific-brief-emerging-variant.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/more/scientific-br...</a>
What happens if the world gets into a situation where the virus mutates rapidly and we find the vaccines becoming less effective?<p>We assume the drug companies will be able to adapt the vaccine quickly to the new variants. If this happens then it creates a few problems..<p>One problem is having to continuously distribute a new vaccine to people indefinitely.<p>Another problem is only certain countries are capable of manufacturing the vaccine. So you have a kind of supply chain scarcity develop where only certain people in certain countries will be able to get one.<p>I've seen mixed reports about whether the current vaccine will hold up as variants appear.
People appear to be expecting there will be "weaker" variant/strains/mutations of this virus as time goes on. I am not sure why this is the mainstream thought.<p>Shouldn't these viruses get selectively better at fighting human immune systems? And we're throwing 750.000 new hosts to this virus worldwide every day.
How is this news at all? The virus has been mutating and throwing off different strains all along. There are entire websites devoted to tracking these, e.g., [1]<p>Perhaps this is just the normal operation of American media to exaggerate the negative side of the situation? [2]<p>[1] <a href="https://nextstrain.org/sars-cov-2/" rel="nofollow">https://nextstrain.org/sars-cov-2/</a><p>[2] PDF link: <a href="https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w28110/w28110.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w28110/w281...</a>
It is difficult to know what sources of information to trust. I already have antibodies, and thought I would be ok for a while. If this is a new strain, how would they know to make a vaccine for it, and how many vaccines will I need each year?<p>Also, the article here says "case count". I'm really interested in the count of "excess deaths".
New paper on transmissiblity in the UK: [1]<p>NYT article on paper: [2]<p>[1] <a href="https://cmmid.github.io/topics/covid19/reports/uk-novel-variant/2020_12_23_Transmissibility_and_severity_of_VOC_202012_01_in_England.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://cmmid.github.io/topics/covid19/reports/uk-novel-vari...</a><p>[2] <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/23/health/coronavirus-uk-variant.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/23/health/coronavirus-uk-var...</a>
It's not too surprising to anyone following the events. Retroactive blood testing of donated blood should the original strain (the phrase original variant sounds like an oxymoron) having reached places like France and NY months earlier than we realized, certainly November if not September of 2018. The magic of the virus is its ability to travel and spread undetected due to asymptomatic carriers.<p>At least now widespread testing is available and we're able to track new variants in geography and time. Looks like the mutated one mentioned just hit France a couple of days ago.
Just wait until it mutates and starts killing kids. Kids are currently the last to be vaccinated. I know this is morbid but this does not bode well but there is precedent. Spanish flu first only killed the elderly and then on its return killed young adults and kids disproportionately. Now the Spanish flu was influenza and this is coronavirus but this specific coronavirus should not be underestimated. I’ve said this from the beginning and I hope I’m wrong.
There are two important things to temper how worried you should be:<p>1. Many times there is an inverse relationship between ease of transmission, and severity of symptoms. There is a good chance that this new more transmissible mutant is likely to make people less sick.<p>2. So far all the available evidence seems to indicate that the vaccines will be effects against this strain as well.
Mutation is simply a loaded term for variation, nothing horrible or shocking is happening.<p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25538675" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25538675</a><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutation" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutation</a>