Belgian scientific base in Antarctica engulfed by Covid despite strict measures • Hacker News Board

Re: Belgian scientific base in Antarctica engulfed by Covid despite strict measures

#221

Post by microtherion » Sat, Jan 01, 2022, 8:50 AM UTC

anonygler wrote: post #37

makk wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hospitalizations tend to precede fatalities. While I hope you're right, it's too early (by a couple weeks in the US, at least) to start trumpeting a "minuscule fatality rate". https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/current-covid-patients-ho...

Unless you’re elderly or have health issues, Covid fatality rate was already very, very low. Therapeutics make that even better.

It depends on your definition of "elderly", "health issues", and "very, very low".

There were 60,000 US fatalities of people younger than 50 (1 Vietnam War's worth of US casualties, or, if you prefer, 15,000 Benghazis).

Yes, for many of the dead, you can retroactively point to "health issues", but those are _extremely_ common, even among people who generally don't consider themselves "chronically ill" at all. And some of the "health issues" might come down to having a bad set of certain genes that up to now have never caused any significant issues.

Finally, there are other Covid consequences than death. I personally know several people (some of them perfectly healthy people in their early 20s) dealing with fatigue/loss of taste for a year (and counting). Personally, I'm fairly confident that the risk of severe outcomes of an acute COVID-19 infection are minuscule for me, thanks to vaccination (So that's a vast improvement over a year ago), but the risks of chronic complications are not as well managed with vaccines, are not particularly closely correlated with severity of the acute infection, and are, as of yet, practically unknown for the omicron variant.

Re: Belgian scientific base in Antarctica engulfed by Covid despite strict measures

#222

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Jan 01, 2022, 8:52 AM UTC

ddingus wrote: post #110

nradov wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A positive test indicates they are probably shedding pieces of viral genetic material. It doesn't necessarily mean they are shedding active virions. Sometimes there are just leftover fragments. In other rare cases immunocompromised individuals can experience prolonged active infections lasting for months.

Word of the day: virons = a complete virus particle that consists of an RNA or DNA core with a protein coat sometimes with external envelopes and that is the extracellular infectious form of a virus. For me, the intrigue centers on my personal realization that I pretty much never think about individual pieces. And that is what this word is all about. It's everything needed for Covid to happen, no less, no more.

[deleted]

Re: Belgian scientific base in Antarctica engulfed by Covid despite strict measures

#223

Post by microtherion » Sat, Jan 01, 2022, 9:03 AM UTC

chana_masala wrote: post #216

belltaco wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please, not this misinformation and fake news on HN too. There's enough of it on Facebook and right wing circles.

How? That's what the linked CDC page says.

No, it's not. What the page says is that ONE PCR test (the oldest one) is being phased out. If you look at the page of tests still authorised, you'll see lots of PCR tests: https://www.fda.gov/medical-devices/coronavirus-disease-2019...

And the page says nothing about the now-withdrawn test being unable to differentiate between Covid and Influenza (which is not true). It encourages the development of tests that test for BOTH (since the patient is being tested anyway), but points out that those results must be reported separately.

Re: Belgian scientific base in Antarctica engulfed by Covid despite strict measures

#224

Post by ssl232 » Sat, Jan 01, 2022, 9:08 AM UTC

mattkrause wrote: post #98

ssl232 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Third option: flawed hypothesis. Swabbing the nose or throat and performing subsequent RT-PCR analysis is not an infallable indicator of whether or not someone is free from the virus SARS-CoV-2 or infected with or likely to become infected with the respiratory disease COVID-19. Before 2020 such tests were typically only used as a part of a diagnosis by a medical professional upon consultation, typically also alongsid…

Not sure there are many animal reservoirs in Antartica, where the only mammals are seals and cetaceans, neither of which have much human contact.

There are humans in Antarctica though. As I said, humans can carry the virus and not set off a test.

Re: Belgian scientific base in Antarctica engulfed by Covid despite strict measures

#225

Post by refurb » Sat, Jan 01, 2022, 9:08 AM UTC

timr wrote: post #71

KennyBlanken wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nose swabs reveal whether you're shedding the particles and thus infectious. It doesn't matter if you're infected if you're not shedding the virus. They are also exceptionally reliable. The home test kit I used had a sub-1% false negative rate.

> Nose swabs reveal whether you're shedding the particles and thus infectious. It doesn't matter if you're infected if you're not shedding the virus. No, they really don't. Swabbing for RNA picks up gene fragments that may or may not be from infectious virus -- it's why we see positive tests for months after infection in some people. Swabbing for viral protein is debatably more likely to detect the thing of interest…

Agree with all of this. PCR literally involves amplifying segments of genetic material so it can be detected. All you need is a segment of genetic material, not the whole virus.

However, I’m not sure the value in antigen testing? Sure, when you’re traveling or have to into a higher risk situation.

But Singapore decided to freely give out antigen tests and what happened was people who tested positive showed up at the ER. And the antigen tests weren’t reliable, so PCR had to confirm. And they have a high vaccination rate so after all that testing the answer was “go home and if you get really sick, come back”.

It finally dawned on them that could just be the message anyways - if you don’t feel bad, don’t worry. If you do, you can test but don’t seek medical care unless you have severe symptoms.

Re: Belgian scientific base in Antarctica engulfed by Covid despite strict measures

#226

Post by koonsolo » Sat, Jan 01, 2022, 9:09 AM UTC

petercooper wrote: post #25

Viruses are interesting things. I once enjoyed a case study about an outbreak of common cold on an Antarctic base that only happened after 17 weeks of isolation: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2130424/ (I'm no virologist but given that the common cold didn't seem to be impacted by the severe lockdowns in the UK at all, whereas flu was, I've gotten the - uneducated - feeling the cold is a bit like some S…

There is this old grandma theory that "don't run outside with wet hair, you'll catch a cold".

Then we learned that viruses cannot spread like that, and so that old theory is basically invalid.

But some time ago I read somewhere that this theory might still hold true somehow, because our nose stores all kinds of viruses, and they might burst out when we are weakened.

Maybe someone more knowledgeable about this might chime in here ;).

Re: Belgian scientific base in Antarctica engulfed by Covid despite strict measures

#227

Post by tjpnz » Sat, Jan 01, 2022, 9:15 AM UTC

tinus_hn wrote: post #213

jhugo wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most likely nothing serious, but given their remote location, if they get unlucky and even one person needs hospital treatment beyond what's possible at the base, that's a big problem.

Just like when any other issue arises that requires hospitalization.

The issues they're not able to deal with tend to be slow burners. You might get a week to plan an evacuation or supply drop for a cancer patient. But with Covid Pneumonia not so much.

Re: Belgian scientific base in Antarctica engulfed by Covid despite strict measures

#228

Post by Aerroon » Sat, Jan 01, 2022, 9:33 AM UTC

juskrey wrote: post #106

petercooper wrote: post #25

Viruses are interesting things. I once enjoyed a case study about an outbreak of common cold on an Antarctic base that only happened after 17 weeks of isolation: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2130424/ (I'm no virologist but given that the common cold didn't seem to be impacted by the severe lockdowns in the UK at all, whereas flu was, I've gotten the - uneducated - feeling the cold is a bit like some S…

After years of self-observations I have a petty theory that, in addition to outside infections, we always have a zoo of cold viruses inside, and different factors trigger them from time to time. I am quite surprised this is never discussed and mentioned by scientific community. BTW for some other viruses this is well documented and acknowledged, but with cold/flu/covid we seem to suffer worldwide scientific amnesia.

I thought this is how viruses operated in general. If somebody gets infected by herpes they basically have it for life. It only rarely flares up, but it's clearly still there. I figured this applied to all/most viruses because of the way viruses reproduce. The immune system just takes care of them and prevents the viral load from increasing. Is that not the case?

Re: Belgian scientific base in Antarctica engulfed by Covid despite strict measures

#229

Post by dilyevsky » Sat, Jan 01, 2022, 9:39 AM UTC

desine wrote: post #46

MobileVet wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Strep can lay ‘dormant’ in people for a while. Two months after the original outbreak and lockdown my daughter got strep. We hadn’t seen a soul. Dr said one of us was likely the carrier.

Had your daughter had it before? Once you get strep, you tend to get it semi-frequently. I get it once every couple of years. I always kind of wondered if it's like a viral infection such as cold sores where it lays dormant permanently, and flares up on occasion. However it is bacterial, and not viral, which counts against that idea.

Why is being bacterial count against it? Lyme and tb are bacterial also and known to do such a thing

Re: Belgian scientific base in Antarctica engulfed by Covid despite strict measures

#230

Post by kzrdude » Sat, Jan 01, 2022, 9:55 AM UTC

koonsolo wrote: post #226

petercooper wrote: post #25

Viruses are interesting things. I once enjoyed a case study about an outbreak of common cold on an Antarctic base that only happened after 17 weeks of isolation: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2130424/ (I'm no virologist but given that the common cold didn't seem to be impacted by the severe lockdowns in the UK at all, whereas flu was, I've gotten the - uneducated - feeling the cold is a bit like some S…

There is this old grandma theory that "don't run outside with wet hair, you'll catch a cold". Then we learned that viruses cannot spread like that, and so that old theory is basically invalid. But some time ago I read somewhere that this theory might still hold true somehow, because our nose stores all kinds of viruses, and they might burst out when we are weakened. Maybe someone more knowledgeable about this might c…

I think that saying is a bit unfairly mailgned.

For making fire, there is the rule of three, the triangle, and you need all sides to keep combustion going:

- Heat

- Fuel

- Oxygen

knock one out and it falters.

We should describe infections the same way. Needed for infection:

- Virus/pathogen

- Outer defenses penetration (skin/mucous membranes)

- Immune system defeat

Seeing it that way, it doesn't have to be so mysterious. Some viruses are dormant or almost omnipresent. The infection may be triggered by other conditions changing, including factors that affect your immune system status or efficiency of your outer protections!