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A (possible) solution to Covid-19

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Re: A (possible) solution to Covid-19

#271

Post by dboreham »

buboard wrote: post #60
ImaCake wrote: post #47

I want to argue that the flaw in this is with the ability to find any strain that consistently causes only minor symptoms. If you infect a whole group of people with Covid-19 then we would see a distribution of severity from no symptoms to lethal. This broad spectrum is really just it's statistical variance (whatever the underlying distribution really looks like). It is worth comparing this to things like SARS. The d…

This paper argues on the basis of symptoms that there might be a milder strain that has dominated some countries vs others https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.03.28.20036715v...

There may be other explanations such as past use of vaccines for other diseases, that varies country to country.

Re: A (possible) solution to Covid-19

#272

Post by nroets »

efavdb wrote: post #249

Pooling could be used to more rapidly test the asymptomatic population: https://github.com/EFavDB/pooling

Has anyone used it to better estimate size of the infected population, like a statistical binary search combined with random sampling ?

Here in South Africa, we are really unsure if our lockdown is having the a meaningful effect.

Re: A (possible) solution to Covid-19

#273

Post by danieltillett »

JohnJamesRambo wrote: post #267

I like your idea a lot. It seems that a 12 nucleotide insertion mutation is responsible for a lot of the Covid-19 virulence. If such a large mutation is possible, how would we prevent your loss of function asymptomatic strain from reverting its mutation in the wild? How big of a mutation are you envisioning? Is it impossible for it to be reverted in the wild or just unlikely? https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-02…

I think 12 nucleotides is too small, I would be happier with something north of 30. There have already been strains identified with a deletion of 382 bases [0].

0. https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.03.11.987222v1....

Re: A (possible) solution to Covid-19

#274

Post by benibela »

cc81 wrote: post #102
Lordarminius wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>What we really want is a strain that has infected a whole lot of people and all of them have had a mild case How about 10 to 50 million ? I live in Nigeria. Between December and late February, many people in Nigeria and Ghana report experiencing symptoms similar to those that could be caused moderate COVID-19 infection. These included, fever, diarhoea, cough, sore throat, malaise. Many physicians and scientists I kn…

That is also the symptoms of the ordinary flu which is the more likely candidate.

Lassa fever also occurs often in Nigeria

Re: A (possible) solution to Covid-19

#275

Post by ajross »

danieltillett wrote: post #269
IdoRA wrote: post #259

A naturally attenuated strain would still be regulated. In the US, 21 USC §321(g): > (1) The term "drug" means… (B) articles intended for use in the diagnosis, cure, mitigation, treatment, or prevention of disease in man or other animals; CBER would be the responsible center for the FDA. Other countries have analogous regulations. Could you come to market with a naturally attenuated strain? Yes. Would it take less ti…

There are plenty of shortcuts in medicine. Think how you would stop this strain from being spread by individuals once it was identified. This strain will spread no matter what the FDA says. Personally I think the regulatory authorities would rapid approve it based on the epidemiology data collected in the process of finding the strain. The FDA has already shown that it can move faster than its usual glacial pace give…

Serious question: are we not? People are sequencing these things like crazy (c.f. the nextstrain.org data). Epidemiologists are working like mad to come up with data on severity in regions all over the globe. Virologists everywhere are dropping what they're doing otherwise to work on covid.

It sorta strains reason to argue that none of these people thought of looking for an attenuated strain.

Isn't the simpler truth just that finding one takes a lot of ground work that's already being done, but hasn't born fruit yet?

Re: A (possible) solution to Covid-19

#277

Post by m348e912 »

I'm late to the comment party but I wanted to say our hope might just be better treatment (and not a vaccine). Covid-19 doesn't have to fatal as long as hospitals _don't_ use their standard protocol. Here's what I mean: https://www.evms.edu/media/evms_public/departments/internal_...

Re: A (possible) solution to Covid-19

#278

Post by buboard »

ajross wrote: post #275
danieltillett wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are plenty of shortcuts in medicine. Think how you would stop this strain from being spread by individuals once it was identified. This strain will spread no matter what the FDA says. Personally I think the regulatory authorities would rapid approve it based on the epidemiology data collected in the process of finding the strain. The FDA has already shown that it can move faster than its usual glacial pace give…

Serious question: are we not? People are sequencing these things like crazy (c.f. the nextstrain.org data). Epidemiologists are working like mad to come up with data on severity in regions all over the globe. Virologists everywhere are dropping what they're doing otherwise to work on covid. It sorta strains reason to argue that none of these people thought of looking for an attenuated strain. Isn't the simpler truth…

they re probably not sequencing asymptomatic people's virus, it would require some specific expedition. it doesn't even sound hard or expensive

reply to @ajross:

how would they know someone is asymptomatic? afaik they are mostly testing people who have symptoms , and their contacts (who will have contracted the same , symptomatic strain)

I think in germany they did antibody testing, or PCR of swabs of people who mostly no longer had a live virus infection to sequence. also, it seems the idea has merit; and i havent read about any team looking for this specific method (identify gene deletions and tracing). It certainly doesn't hurt (and doesnt cost much) to try

btw sweden is doing a survey of live infections in stockholm, however i don't think that they sequence the viruses

to @danieltillet:

maybe post about it in reddit on r/covid19, some epidemiologists hang out there for the latest news

Re: A (possible) solution to Covid-19

#279

Post by danieltillett »

nabla9 wrote: post #237
danieltillett wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody knows the true infection fatality rate. Probably the best estimate we can make is from South Korea where they have done a pretty good job of testing everyone infected. There the infection fatality rate is 1.8% and rising as the cases age out and people in the ICUs die.

> Nobody known the true infection fatality rate. It can be estimated with increasing accuracy. > There the infection fatality rate is 1.8% and rising as the cases age out and people in the ICUs die. You continue citing case fatality rate (CFR) numbers and call them infection fatality rate numbers (IFR). Can you please go back to your sources and read what they say. I bet they are case fatality rates. In South Korea o…

These lower estimates are all estimates.

Really it is not important from the perspective of doing something about this pandemic as a huge number of people will die at all estimated levels.

Re: A (possible) solution to Covid-19

#280

Post by buboard »

IdoRA wrote: post #259

A naturally attenuated strain would still be regulated. In the US, 21 USC §321(g): > (1) The term "drug" means… (B) articles intended for use in the diagnosis, cure, mitigation, treatment, or prevention of disease in man or other animals; CBER would be the responsible center for the FDA. Other countries have analogous regulations. Could you come to market with a naturally attenuated strain? Yes. Would it take less ti…

i doubt that , if this magical strain does exist, any regulation is going to stop people from just getting themselves infected
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