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The mutation that helps Delta spread

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Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#291

Post by Trasmatta »

raphlinus wrote: post #173
pengaru wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Influenza is a different virus which mutates aggressively (recombinant), I'm not under the impression sars-cov2 is similar in this regard.

Buckle up. Quoted tweet[1] below: Congrats to Ben Jackson, @maciekboni, @viralverity, @AineToole, @robertson_lab, @EvolveDotZoo, @arambaut et al for their recent Cell paper. Rock solid evidence of alpha/non-alpha recombination in #SARSCoV2 in the UK. https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(21)00984-3 [1]: https://twitter.com/MichaelWorobey/status/142851583662971699...

Can somebody ELI5 what this means, and what the implications are?

Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#292

Post by nradov »

phkahler wrote: post #220
loosescrews wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Note that it appears that it is still unknown how likely breakthrough infections are to result in long Covid. The very limited data that does exist indicates that the likelyhood is rather high (~20%). https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/16/well/live/vaccine-long-co...

Isn't long Covid caused by damage from the spike proteins? In that case, repeatedly giving people the vaccine might do damage as well since it gets you to produce those spike proteins right?

Long COVID isn't a distinct disease, it's just a vague label for a set of non specific symptoms. There is evidence that some cases are caused by re-activation of dormant Epstein-Barr virus infections.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8233978/

If proven correct that wouldn't be at all surprising. We already know that major stresses can sometimes reactivate EBV. It might be a good idea to also test all COVID-19 patients for EBV.

Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#293

Post by ostrichlamb »

BugsJustFindMe wrote: post #219
johnbaker92 wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have we perhaps forgotten about Sweden which: - Did not force lockdown / masks onto anybody - Has one of the least vaccinated population in Europe (around 40% afaik) - Has had 0 covid deaths in the last couple weeks. - Has not had it worse than countries with stricter mandates. Are we also forgetting about Iceland / Israel which are among the most vaccinated countries in the world (on top of having stringent mandates…

> Have we perhaps forgotten about Sweden: - Has not had it worse than countries with stricter mandates. Please explain this graph comparing Covid deaths in Sweden to its immediate neighbors that shows the opposite of what you're saying: https://ourworldindata.org/explorers/coronavirus-data-explor... > - Has had 0 covid deaths in the last couple weeks. Deaths per week are a function of previous deaths and population d…

> Deaths per week are a function of previous deaths and population distribution. If more people die at the beginning, then fewer are left to die later. That's how dying works. Sweden's weekly per capita deaths peaked much higher than in the US or EU overall, and they've lost more people per capita than their neighbors.

Is this necessarily an issue though? They've managed to keep a reasonable way of life through those times while building a natural immunity to this disease. They're also not implementing any inhumane / dystopian measures like "health passports" and the like. At some point we have to look beyond the number of cases / deaths as the only "success measure" for dealing with this thing. The level of humanity (although hard to assess with numbers but easy to see for the humans among us) needs to be factored in here.

> My common sense says that people who refuse the vaccine should just be refused access to hospital resources if they get sick. It would neatly address a lot of issues.

Should we carry on with this logic and ban the [obese / overweight / inactive / drinkers / smokers / stressed / etc.] from the hospitals because they could have done something about their health that would ultimately have prevented them from getting sick? This is a slippery slope, but I'm sure you'll quickly understand why.

That being said, if I also no longer have to pay taxes that fund these establishments (and get refund on previous contributions), I might take your deal .. That's another discussion though.

Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#294

Post by polote »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #210
irthomasthomas wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Long Covid has the same symptoms as stress, anxiety and depression, which are to be expected after contracting a pandemic level virus and being forced to isolate. Is there any proof yet that it is any more than that?

Stress, anxiety and depression don't show up as lung damage on MRI scans.

Almost none of the 20% people mentionned had a MRI scan. So you don't answer the question.

The problem of long covid studies is they don't have a control group, so it is easy to say wrong things.

Its probably closer to 1-4% than 20%

Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#295

Post by nitrogen »

Closi wrote: post #288
nitrogen wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are the stats on that, especially vs. other severe respiratory diseases? Asking because I've had "long covid" since long before there was a COVID, so either everyone's making a bigger deal out of it than necessary, or I'm actually much worse off relative to normal than I thought and I should really be questioning my doctors.

> Asking because I've had "long covid" since long before there was a COVID Well that isn’t “Long Covid” then. Symptoms can come from a variety of causes, and just because you suffered some of the same symptoms unrelated to a Covid infection doesn’t mean that others won’t experience similar symptoms after Covid.

So what are the percentages of people who will have long-term symptoms from Covid, how does that compare in severity and frequency to other respiratory diseases, and if it wasn't something people cared about before Covid, why do they care now?

Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#296

Post by jjwiseman »

sreque wrote: post #232
rescripting wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A recent study showed having had COVID before offers less protection from reinfection than the vaccine [0]. "The study of hundreds of Kentucky residents with previous infections through June 2021 found that those who were unvaccinated had 2.34 times the odds of reinfection compared with those who were fully vaccinated. The findings suggest that among people who have had COVID-19 previously, getting fully vaccinated p…

This article completely destroy the CDC's report: https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2021/08/more-voodoo-e... . The CDC's report is a fantastic example as to why the CDC don't deserve our trust. They are dishonest. They cherry pick data to fit their narrative. They are unburdened by the constraints of peer review. They admit in their own study that it can't apply causation and yet they remain silent as the media…

https://www.covid-datascience.com/post/israeli-data-how-can-... argues that people are misinterpreting the Israeli data due to Simpson's paradox:

  In the case of vaccine efficacy vs. severe disease, it is
  the fact that both vaccination status and risk of severe 
  disease are systematically higher in the older age group 
  that makes overall efficacy numbers if estimated without 
  stratifying by age misleading, producing a paradoxical 
  result that the overall efficacy (67.5%) is much lower 
  than the efficacy for either of the age groups (91.8% and 
  85.2%).

Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#297

Post by rileyphone »

criticaltinker wrote: post #152
nradov wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same as with what probably happened with HCoV-OC43, another betacoronavirus very similar to SARS-CoV-2. Evidence indicates that it caused a worldwide pandemic that killed a lot of people starting in 1889. Now it's endemic. Most of us catch it when we're young and healthy which gives us partial immunity later. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7252012/ https://sfamjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.111…

> Fortunately the vaccines are very effective at preventing death Yes individuals who have been vaccinated or recovered from natural infection will have durable immunity and significantly lower risk of severe outcomes like hospitalization and death. [5][6] The real question: is mass vaccination effective at preventing the spread and increasing trasmission/virulence of variants of concern? A growing body of the scient…

[2] states: > The UK should continue to proactively support a strategy of worldwide effective vaccination in order to drive down global viral load reducing the likelihood of dangerous variants emerging in other parts of the world.

In any case, even if vaccines lead to stronger variants (as some of the research you cited states is possible), a game theoretical situation is created where enough people are vaccinated that those who are not are just leaving themselves in greater danger. And in the case of a mutation breaking out of the vaccine, [2] suggests just to immediately start making a new one with the same technology.

Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#298

Post by newacct583 »

aplummer wrote: post #285
civilized wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Compulsory mass vaccination using the current vaccines poses a serious public health risk [1][2][3] None of your references say this or anything remotely implying this. Backing up a provocative claim with a snowblind of irrelevant references is a shameful misinformation tactic and you should stop doing it immediately. Doing it in a public health context is particularly dangerous and frankly disgusting.

Thanks for adding this. Compulsory mass vaccination is one of the greatest medical miracles in human history, possibly the actual single greatest. Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_lung#/media/File:Poumon_a...

Second greatest. Antibiotics take the crown.

Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#299

Post by nazgulnarsil »

jdavis703 wrote: post #165
hncurious wrote: post #70

Covid is going to be endemic like the flu and cold. It's not going to be eradicated, unfortunately, and I don't think we've come to terms with this yet. Now what's our plan exactly? Get vaccinated every 6 - 12 months indefinitely and always wear masks? What's our goal and what's our new normal?

Yeah, as long as COVID-19 fills up hospitals we should do this. Not having hospitals seriously compromises quality of life. I had untreated kidney stones for about a week at the peak of the pandemic. When I was in the middle of an attack I could not work, the pain was too severe. I was missing several hours of work everyday just dealing with pain. I finally got to the emergency room which did basic imaging and gave m…

For people in a similar situation. Chanca Piedra might help.

Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#300

Post by tunesmith »

jmfldn wrote: post #151

Purely anecdotal but I'm double vaccinated (Astra Zeneca) and I caught Covid recently. It was probably Delta as 99% of cases in UK are. I know of quite a few vaccinated friends who've caught it recently too. Mainly AZ I think but one was Pfizer (single jabbed). Anyway, none of us had severe illness although I felt pretty rough for a few days like I had a really bad cold and smell went for a week completely. I was bas…

"Selective pressure". I find this phrase really confusing, because I think people use it differently. I'm still trying to nail down my own knowledge about this, but here's the gist I have so far.

Viruses are not like bacteria. Bacteria can mutate in direct response to antibiotics. Viruses cannot mutate in direct response to vaccines. Some people use "selection pressure" to describe what happens with bacteria and antibiotics. Others use it in a looser sense.

Viruses mutate purely randomly. Now, if a virus happens to mutate in a way that escapes vaccines, and if vaccinated people are more likely to party because they are vaccinated, then yes, you could argue the mutation has an advantage against other variants the vaccine has protected against, in a social sense. Some people use "selection pressure" in this sense, which I think causes confusion.

So the more relevant question is, if a virus mutates in an unvaccinated person, and that mutation happens to have the ability to escape all current vaccines, then, can the virus spread faster in a 50% vaccinated community than a 0% vaccinated community?

Answers as far as I can tell:

- Arguably yes, if the 0% vaccinated community is so sick from other variants that they aren't out and about to get exposed to the new variant. But I think this answer is cheating and doesn't get to the heart of the question. So, control for population activity and assume that both the 0% and 50% populations have the same chance of being exposed.

- If the 0% vaccinated community is infected with variants that can "crowd out" the newer mutation, then it could grow faster in the 50% vaccinated community. But I don't know if this is actually possible - I do know it's possible to catch multiple variants at one time, and I'd expect that usually a mutation that is more fit in terms of escapability might also have fitness advantages with transmissibility.

- If the mutation responded to the vaccine, in a direct biological sense, then it would clearly grow faster in the 50% population since it wouldn't have existed otherwise. But this is the scenario that not possible as I understand it, since it is based on a misunderstanding of how viruses work.

I welcome any corrections from those who are more familiar with this.

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