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Omicron variant more resistant to vaccine but causes less severe Covid: study

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Omicron variant more resistant to vaccine but causes less severe Covid: study

#111

Post by sjwalter »

wonderwonder wrote: post #98
tn890 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I would suspect that most people who are were already vulnerable have already passed or built immunity if the virus is equally dangerous, resulting in a lower than equal death rate despite equivalent risk. You are forgetting about the most vulnerable group of all: immunosuppressed people. They cannot mount a sufficient immune response, in severe immunosuppression like after a transplant event months or years after.…

I live in a state where mask mandates are essentially gone. Very few people wear masks here and they are not required in schools so only ~5% of kids are wearing them at my children's elementary school. Everything seems pretty good so far, no marked rise in cases and almost no cases in my kids school over the last year, maybe 25 total, all mild. I am in no way saying masks don't work, in fact I think that they do. Wit…

> I am in no way saying masks don't work, in fact I think that they do.

This is still so hilarious to me. It's pretty obvious that some masks work, that is, n95 or whatever actual respirator masks. It's pretty obvious that other masks don't work at all, that is, 99.99% of masks worn by the public at large.

Re: Omicron variant more resistant to vaccine but causes less severe Covid: study

#112

Post by NicoJuicy »

wokwokwok wrote: post #53
gjsman-1000 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would suspect that most people who are were already vulnerable have already passed or built immunity if the virus is equally dangerous, resulting in a lower than equal death rate despite equivalent risk. Although... Can we never, not even once, be a little optimistic? To me, the news that we may be replacing COVID with a less severe strain is some of the best news of the year. COVID clearly isn't going away at this…

Wanting something to be true does not make it true. Even if it turns up to actually be true , the fact that so many people want it to be true is an excellent reason to be cautious in how you look at things here, because that is causing a lot of people to say things that haven’t been proven to be true. The evidence so far looks like cause to be cautiously optimistic, but when the people giving out that evidence say “i…

According to what I heard through the Covid update of work. Omicron settles more in the nose and not as much in the long ( their source was a doctor).

Although it's too early to be sure, it would explain both an increased transmissibility and a milder variant.

Re: Omicron variant more resistant to vaccine but causes less severe Covid: study

#113

Post by sjwalter »

xyproto wrote: post #99
ufo wrote: post #13

The title is misleading. It is possible that Omicron is just as severe and that the effect in the study is because a large percentage of the population had some immunity from a previous infection or vaccine. > South Africa has a quite high seroprevalence of prior infection, particularly after delta, and in some parts of South Africa up to 80 percent of people were exposed to previous infection. We don’t think it’s a…

There are plenty of people in intensive care, though.

There always are. Average hospital staffing and resource levels mean at its minimum ICUs are at ~78% capacity. Come low vitamin-D season, January or February, most ICUs hit capacity every year.

Google doesn't run its data centers at 5% capacity for the same reasons ICUs don't.

Re: Omicron variant more resistant to vaccine but causes less severe Covid: study

#114

Post by bingohbangoh »

ufo wrote: post #13

The title is misleading. It is possible that Omicron is just as severe and that the effect in the study is because a large percentage of the population had some immunity from a previous infection or vaccine. > South Africa has a quite high seroprevalence of prior infection, particularly after delta, and in some parts of South Africa up to 80 percent of people were exposed to previous infection. We don’t think it’s a…

Weird, I thought that the natural immunity from COVID-19 wasn't as strong as the vaccine.

Re: Omicron variant more resistant to vaccine but causes less severe Covid: study

#115

Post by colordrops »

ufo wrote: post #13

The title is misleading. It is possible that Omicron is just as severe and that the effect in the study is because a large percentage of the population had some immunity from a previous infection or vaccine. > South Africa has a quite high seroprevalence of prior infection, particularly after delta, and in some parts of South Africa up to 80 percent of people were exposed to previous infection. We don’t think it’s a…

Why is it ok to to be skeptical of findings if they are optimistic when it comes to covid, but if you challenge a pessimistic finding you are an anti-science anti-vaxxer piece of work? Let's be consistent here.

Re: Omicron variant more resistant to vaccine but causes less severe Covid: study

#116

Post by QuarterReptile »

julianozen wrote: post #72
boringg wrote: post #21

I have a question for anyone who has a serious level of knowledge on virus evolution: As viruses evolve over time is there any correlation to severity - do they have trade offs as they evolve? I am hoping that it would be some kind of trade off that the virus makes in that it can spread more easily but not be as severe (I understand that it is unlikely nature requires a trade-off). I ask as my concern is that while t…

I am not a professional. I have been basing a lot of my virus information from Tomas Pueyo. Here is my source: https://unchartedterritories.tomaspueyo.com/p/the-omicron-qu... In this article he clarified that generally viruses that spread more are less severe (as killing the host makes it tougher to spread). The asymptotic nature of Covid sort of broke this assumption because Covid can lie dormant in someone for a we…

>In this article he clarified that generally viruses that spread more are less severe (as killing the host makes it tougher to spread).

It takes far less than death to reduce spread. People who feel sick stay home from work (not guaranteed, but with enough frequency that it matters), don't go out to eat, don't wander around and go to parties, and so on. Any time they're sitting home, they've hurt the chances that their variant is the winning-est variant.

Again with the caveat about dormancy periods for Covid.

Re: Omicron variant more resistant to vaccine but causes less severe Covid: study

#117

Post by Karsteski »

wonderwonder wrote: post #98
tn890 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I would suspect that most people who are were already vulnerable have already passed or built immunity if the virus is equally dangerous, resulting in a lower than equal death rate despite equivalent risk. You are forgetting about the most vulnerable group of all: immunosuppressed people. They cannot mount a sufficient immune response, in severe immunosuppression like after a transplant event months or years after.…

I live in a state where mask mandates are essentially gone. Very few people wear masks here and they are not required in schools so only ~5% of kids are wearing them at my children's elementary school. Everything seems pretty good so far, no marked rise in cases and almost no cases in my kids school over the last year, maybe 25 total, all mild. I am in no way saying masks don't work, in fact I think that they do. Wit…

> Not arguing with you, just genuinely interested on how long you would advocate for mask mandates? Would you be willing to accept mask mandates in perpetuity?

This is the problem, isn't it? For how long will these mandates be in place for? Right now, it's clear that they won't end until populations start revolting.

Re: Omicron variant more resistant to vaccine but causes less severe Covid: study

#118

Post by jjk166 »

fer wrote: post #39
boringg wrote: post #21

I have a question for anyone who has a serious level of knowledge on virus evolution: As viruses evolve over time is there any correlation to severity - do they have trade offs as they evolve? I am hoping that it would be some kind of trade off that the virus makes in that it can spread more easily but not be as severe (I understand that it is unlikely nature requires a trade-off). I ask as my concern is that while t…

It depends on what you call severity. If severity means the host dies quickly rather than slowly, there's obviously selection pressure and that mutation will die off relatively quickly vs the rest, since it won't have as many chances to spread as the less severe strain. E.g. SARS/MERS. If severity means the host dies more often, but it still takes a long time to die, the selection pressure is much lower, and it will…

Spanish Flu did evolve to become more mild. All modern seasonal flu variants are descended from it.

Re: Omicron variant more resistant to vaccine but causes less severe Covid: study

#119

Post by QuarterReptile »

simonh wrote: post #25
raphaelj wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could it be because we just got slightly better at treating Covid before hospitalization?

How do we treat Covid before hospitalisation? I just caught it at the weekend and feeling pretty crappy. I'm not aware of any particular treatment I should be taking.

This is another problem of the modal Western approach. Few people have any knowledge of mitigating strategies or medications because we've moved so aggressively to eradicate discussion of those things.

Re: Omicron variant more resistant to vaccine but causes less severe Covid: study

#120

Post by galangalalgol »

wokwokwok wrote: post #53
gjsman-1000 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would suspect that most people who are were already vulnerable have already passed or built immunity if the virus is equally dangerous, resulting in a lower than equal death rate despite equivalent risk. Although... Can we never, not even once, be a little optimistic? To me, the news that we may be replacing COVID with a less severe strain is some of the best news of the year. COVID clearly isn't going away at this…

Wanting something to be true does not make it true. Even if it turns up to actually be true , the fact that so many people want it to be true is an excellent reason to be cautious in how you look at things here, because that is causing a lot of people to say things that haven’t been proven to be true. The evidence so far looks like cause to be cautiously optimistic, but when the people giving out that evidence say “i…

Don't all viruses become more mild over time? Even Ebola gets much less lethal towards the end of an outbreak as it evolves to preserve its habitat. Small pox is a possible counter ecample it seems like it was pretty lethal for millennia.
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