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Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

japantimes.co.jp

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Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#171

Post by ValentineC »

howlgarnish wrote: post #113
starkd wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

that's because it's an island. All the islands are doing better than whole continents. You can't contain it unless you go full bore like the chinese - locking people into their homes.

Sigh, this old canard again. Vietnam, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Singapore are all doing fine without "locking people into their homes" and they're not islands. (Ok, Singapore technically is an island but it's connected to Malaysia by the world's busiest border crossing; and Thailand's grappling with a new outbreak now but it seems to be improving.)

> Vietnam, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Singapore are all doing fine without "locking people into their homes" and they're not islands.

Malaysia shut its border with Singapore in mid-March [1], and Singapore had what I'd consider a lockdown (most businesses closed, no social gatherings allowed) between 7 April to 19 June [2].

[1] https://www.todayonline.com/8days/eatanddrink/newsandopening...

[2] https://www.gov.sg/article/ending-circuit-breaker-phased-app...

Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#172

Post by jMyles »

Threeve303 wrote: post #46

What happens if the world gets into a situation where the virus mutates rapidly and we find the vaccines becoming less effective? We assume the drug companies will be able to adapt the vaccine quickly to the new variants. If this happens then it creates a few problems.. One problem is having to continuously distribute a new vaccine to people indefinitely. Another problem is only certain countries are capable of manuf…

> What happens if the world gets into a situation where the virus mutates rapidly and we find the vaccines becoming less effective?

This is precisely the world we're in, and which we've been in since the dawn of infectious disease.

Some viruses (in fact, some entire realms of virus) exhibit this phenomenon; they're sharp as hell for things that aren't even a full-fledged organism. But we're sharper, and we make vaccines to account for subtle mutations. Often times, we get it right, which is incredible.

Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#173

Post by nostrademons »

khuey wrote: post #129
nostrademons wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Makes it harder for doctors to get supplies if all the borders are closed. The UK has an upcoming COVID vaccine (the Astra-Zeneca/Oxford one) that may prove useful in the near future. Cut off the UK from the rest of the world and the rest of the world can't benefit from it. Also, it's almost certain that the UK strain is in the US already, and the US is shit at dealing with pandemics once they're on our soil. Border…

Nobody is talking about closing borders to cargo .

Actually they are:

https://news.sky.com/story/emergency-talks-to-prevent-christ...

Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#174

Post by nostrademons »

maxerickson wrote: post #137
nostrademons wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Makes it harder for doctors to get supplies if all the borders are closed. The UK has an upcoming COVID vaccine (the Astra-Zeneca/Oxford one) that may prove useful in the near future. Cut off the UK from the rest of the world and the rest of the world can't benefit from it. Also, it's almost certain that the UK strain is in the US already, and the US is shit at dealing with pandemics once they're on our soil. Border…

Don't people and goods mostly travel separately?

They do, but many of the border closures apply to both.

Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#175

Post by jMyles »

sjg007 wrote: post #152

Just wait until it mutates and starts killing kids. Kids are currently the last to be vaccinated. I know this is morbid but this does not bode well but there is precedent. Spanish flu first only killed the elderly and then on its return killed young adults and kids disproportionately. Now the Spanish flu was influenza and this is coronavirus but this specific coronavirus should not be underestimated. I’ve said this f…

I have found myself concerned about this as well (and thinking about what decision-making for parents must have been like in late summer when this characteristic started to become evident).

Ask yourself: if you're that parent, do you wish that your kid had already been exposed and run a complete course of the virus prior to this mutation?

It seems obvious that the answer is 'yes', and, at least to my way of thinking, is an indictment of the purely horizontal approach to pandemic control so far displayed by states.

Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#176

Post by m-ee »

smnrchrds wrote: post #153
hybrid_cluster wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People line up every year to get a new flu shot because seasonal influenza keeps mutating the part of its hemagglutinin protein where most neutralizing antibodies bind after exposure to a vaccine that carries the entire hemagglutinin protein (embedded in a weakened/inactivated influenza virus). Sure, spike ain't hemagglutinin and corona ain't no influenza, but let's not pretend there's no precedent at all for protein…

Disclosure: I know nothing about the science of vaccines. Perhaps the new mRNA technique could lead to better flu vaccines as well.

NIH is working on it, but it’s taking a backseat to covid

Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#177

Post by stordoff »

michaelt wrote: post #95
rualca wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The UK is no island? An island that has high-speed railway connections to Europe is not exactly isolated from the world, not to mention it's ferry connections with multiple neighboring countries in mainland Europe. Additionally, Great Britain has about 3 times the population of Taiwan, and it's urban centers have between 5 and 7x the population of Taiwan's largest urban centers.

Sure, but all the points of entry to Britain have border controls. If the government ordered the channel tunnel to stop, it would stop. It's not like France, where there are innumerable border crossing points. Of course a total closure would be a last resort, because that would cut off imports of things like fresh fruit, but it's been possible to get 20-minute pinprick blood tests since April (admittedly with lower a…

> If the government ordered the channel tunnel to stop, it would stop. [...] Of course a total closure would be a last resort, because that would cut off imports of things like fresh fruit

As demonstrated by the recent French closure:

> French President Emmanuel Macron went further Sunday, with France barring UK travelers and shutting down the Eurotunnel crossing for at least 48 hours, meaning thousands of trucks carrying goods to the continent will not be able to cross the English Channel.

https://www.businessinsider.com/uk-border-chaos-after-france...

You now require a negative test (PCR or antigen) within the last 7 3 hours, and must be within a permitted category of traveller - https://uk.ambafrance.org/France-to-admit-some-travellers-fr...

Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#178

Post by jandrewrogers »

howlgarnish wrote: post #113
starkd wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

that's because it's an island. All the islands are doing better than whole continents. You can't contain it unless you go full bore like the chinese - locking people into their homes.

Sigh, this old canard again. Vietnam, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Singapore are all doing fine without "locking people into their homes" and they're not islands. (Ok, Singapore technically is an island but it's connected to Malaysia by the world's busiest border crossing; and Thailand's grappling with a new outbreak now but it seems to be improving.)

Viet Nam is not doing fine. I have a lot of contact there, there is an outbreak of “severe pneumonia” for which no one is being tested for COVID despite being pretty obviously COVID. To make matters worse, in addition to not testing anybody with symptoms, the government hospitals have been turning people with these symptoms away so they are going to their family homes to be taken care of.

I would take the stories of Viet Nam’s “success” with a very large grain of salt. It should be impossible for me to know so many people with odd “severe pneumonia” there given that the entire country has nominally only had a thousand cases or so.

Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#179

Post by capkutay »

sjg007 wrote: post #152

Just wait until it mutates and starts killing kids. Kids are currently the last to be vaccinated. I know this is morbid but this does not bode well but there is precedent. Spanish flu first only killed the elderly and then on its return killed young adults and kids disproportionately. Now the Spanish flu was influenza and this is coronavirus but this specific coronavirus should not be underestimated. I’ve said this f…

There’s no evidence that it’s more deadly at this time.

In the words of Derek Lowe...

“Many infectious pathogens, in fact, gradually evolve versus a given animal host to be more infectious and less virulent over time. Remember, it’s not the job of a virus to make people deathly ill: it’s the job of a virus to make more virus.”

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