It's so interesting watching this get picked up by the news.<p>Many aren't aware but interestingly these variants are identified and designated in the open on GitHub, here is the GitHub issue for this B.1.1.529 designation <a href="https://github.com/cov-lineages/pango-designation/issues/343" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/cov-lineages/pango-designation/issues/343</a>. I've recently started watching this repo as it's quite interesting reading about the different variants popping up across the world.
Whenever you hear news about mutated COVID and how fast it spreads there are a few important things to remember.<p>1. Viruses are constantly mutating, its kind of their thing.<p>2. Most mutations do absolutely nothing or are actually harmful to the virus.<p>3. When a new mutation is noted to be spreading fast its usually because of the nature of super spreader events and not because the new mutation is more or less transmissible.<p>4. Scientist and health officials should absolutely be keeping an eye on these things.<p>[0] Vincent Racaniello - SARS-CoV-2 UK variant: Does it matter
<a href="https://youtu.be/wC8ObD2W4Rk" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/wC8ObD2W4Rk</a>
Really simple: If this new variant does nothing more than previous versions to increase mortality, particularly among the increasingly vaccinated population, obsessing over its spread should be considered pointless and absurd. For one thing, it wouldn't work without endless other streams or authoritarian security theater measures (that in any case themselves don't really work most of the time) And for another thing, "stop the spread" is an idiotic notion without heavy qualification. Stop death? Sure, Stop large quantities of hospitalizations? That too, albeit with cost/benefit calculations applied to all measures, but stopping spread itself for its own sake? Absurd paranoia that has no merit the moment the thing spreading stops being a truly widespread threat. We have lived with colds and flus for all our history without obsessing over their spread. COVID among those who are already immunized or vaccinated is comparably dangerous to common flu strains.
This again reminds that having all your own population gotten 3rd jab (or n-th jab) won't make the pandemic disappear.<p>Meanwhile rest of the world hasn't got their first dose of a reliable vaccine.
Variants will continue to to be generated as SARS-CoV-2 is almost certainly endemic. We should be focusing on developing and testing therapeutics and treatment protocols to help as many people as possible, rather than focusing so heavily on vaccinations.
Is Nu <i>/ˈnjuː/ (en) /niː/ (cz)</i> a good name? I assume that most people have heard first few letters of Greek alphabet. Yet after Delta they should have switched to Pokemon names. Would be much more robust. I can already imagine all the misspelling in Twitter rants.
Given the stupefying number of anti-vaxers and rapid viral mutation rates, the only way we get out of this pandemic is by a relatively harmless variant out competing the more deadly ones. Same as with the Spanish Flu.
Dr. McCoy : Who knows? It might eventually cure the common cold, but lengthen lives? Poppycock! I can do more for you if you just eat right and exercise regularly.<p><a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0708474/characters/nm0001420" rel="nofollow">https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0708474/characters/nm0001420</a>
Very interesting graph on preliminary data is here.<p><a href="https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FFECnaLXEAMtWdc?format=png&name=large" rel="nofollow">https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FFECnaLXEAMtWdc?format=png&name=...</a>
A similar thread: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29344274" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29344274</a>
Let’s hope Delta stays dominant - at least for a while - and in time for our next “update” shot:<p><a href="https://github.com/cov-lineages/pango-designation/issues/343#issuecomment-976989249" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/cov-lineages/pango-designation/issues/343...</a>
I'm curious to what extent this sort of data depends on positive tests. It seems there's kind of a contradiction here: we can detect huge numbers of mutations, but only if someone tests positive as otherwise a sample will be ignored by the labs (presumably?). Yet the tests are supposed to be extremely precise.<p>Does anyone know how the need to detect mutations is balanced against the need for the tests to be precise to a specific type of virus?
if this variant is more contagious than Delta Plus, we will see it spreading in the UK. The UK seems to be the hub for corona variants. Alpha and Delta variants went haywire, if this one spreads in the UK we should be on alert.
> So far, the threat B.1.1.529 poses beyond South Africa is far from clear, researchers say. It is unclear whether the variant is more transmissible than Delta<p>this is danger porn. pay it no mind and have happy holidays.
It seems like viruses always tread a spectrum between infectivity and lethality. Does or could a virus exist which:<p>- has a 100% fatality rate, like rabies<p>- can keep the host alive long enough to spread and<p>- cannot be defeated by any prospective vaccine or can evolve fast enough to evade them?<p>Basically, airborne and human-to-human rabies, with no vaccine. Or vaccine resistant ebola, but even more lethal, infectious, and a longer incubation period.<p>Put more concisely, could a virus exist with the potential to wipe us out.
I remember when a major leader at Google told everybody once the vaccine was widely available we'd all go back to work and things would be normal.<p>I laughed and told them that they should stick to CS, and that biology and medicine don't work like computers. They didn't like it (and have since moved to New Zealand).
There is no escape from this unless you attempt to mitigate all your personal health risk factors (diabetes, obesity, etc).<p>I will say this because it is not talked about enough, taking zinc LOZENGES will help right when you get sick because it stimulates the ADAM17 enzyme to cleave ACE2 off of the cells to make Soluble ACE2. The virus attaches to Soluble ACE2 and cannot enter the cell.<p><a href="https://www.mdpi.com/viruses/viruses-12-00491/article_deploy/html/images/viruses-12-00491-g001.png" rel="nofollow">https://www.mdpi.com/viruses/viruses-12-00491/article_deploy...</a>
Natural immunity (including from variolation and small doses of the virus that everyone is constantly being exposed to — acting as a constant low level booster) is formed in response to MANY proteins on the virus, and not just the spike protein.<p>Most vaccines based on an inactivated virus throughout history have stimulated such a response.<p>By contrast, the mRNA vaccines induce a far more limited range of responses — only to a specific protein. So the surface area for the virus needs to mutate escape the immune response is far smaller than from natural immunity or “inactivated virus” vaccines such as the ones which eradicated Smallpox, or Salk’s Polivo vaccine.<p>Why doesn’t this article or many others delve into a distinction between natural immunity / inactivated virus (J&J) immunity and mRNA vaccine induced immunity? It seems like all the reporting is rigged, with almost everyone including scientific journals like Nature seemingly staying away from criticizingmRNA vaccines, and ready to carry water for them even in the absence of evidence in their favor.<p>With the LARGEST studies out of Israel and UK showing thatnatural immunity is far more robust while vaccine immunity wanes and is more limited against mutations, most articles IGNORE this in their reporting and often even claim the opposite — that you should get vaccined even if you have been immune for a year.<p>Homeless people and those constantly exposed to low levels of viruses have more robust immune systems than those who were isolated from everything.
I found it quite striking, that while infections here are balanced through age groups, fatalities are only 60+ and mostly 80+.<p>e.g. seen on the "Dashboard" on rki.de, chart "COVID-19 cases by age group and sex".<p>Stats indicate old people die. Duh. A tragedy in each case, but that's what will happen eventually, right?<p>And a mutated virus mostly is more contagious but less fatal, isn't it? A virus optimises for spreading, not killing it's taxi. Was like that with delta.