Covid-19 Virus

That's a general trait in the sexes. The wife gets a cold, husbands get the flu or even mild pneumonia, needing extra care, love and attention - and it makes us speak in a weak, pathetic voice. It's the way it is.

 

Terrible news if true, but I can’t see how it is.

 

https://twitter.com/politicsforali/status/1353817762372710401?s=21

 

This is one of the situations where the burden of proof needs to be squarely landed on the person making the claim, forcefully and immediately. Anyone making such a damning claim better have evidence, and a lot of it.

 

It’s either true with is terrible, a newspaper printing a wildly inaccurate headline which is terrible, or it’s deflection on the German governments part due to issues/****s up with supply, which is terrible.

Either way someone has been hugely irresponsible.

 

It has to be nonsense. Over and under 65 are not a different species, however ******* weird boomers are. It can’t vary like that over a single threshold.

 

As expected the new strains are making the current vaccines less effective and eventually redundant. This virus will continue to mutate and stay a step ahead of the vaccines. I'm not sure when we will see free and easy worldwide travel again.

EDIT - just seen the above posts on the subject but have left this here for links to the articles...

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/0...plans-after-a-variant-proves-more-challenging
https://www.ft.com/content/c0c8f72c-e58e-4319-80c4-0db153ad85db

 

Every virus mutates. Different strains of influenza are prevalent in different years. And BioNTech say they can engineer a new version inside 6 weeks should new variants arise.

The issue in my view is more about surveillance - can we spot more dangerous, emerging strains early enough to nip them in the bud - and international cooperation in distributing vaccine doses.

 

That’s why we’re now looking at quarantining all arrivals I guess. No good vaccinating everyone if it’s just running riot and mutating like hell in other countries.

 

******* idiots...

https://twitter.com/alexwickham/status/1353999453028577280?s=21

 

Of course but how long does it take to then produce enough to vaccinate the planet, get it transported, get the vaccinations set up and completed ? By which time the virus has mutated again. The whole process takes 6 months ? As I mentioned in another post, I feel we will always be 6 months behind so it will be like using the winter flu 2020 vaccine to vaccinate against winter flu 2021. The sheer scale of infection means there will be new variants in existence now that we don't even know about yet which will become issues in 3-6 months time and require further changes to the vaccine.
There's not a chance we will be able to identify and nip those new varaints in the bud before they are widespread without permanent self-isolation and closure of borders.

 

The original tweet must have been deleted by an hour after @wfc4ever linked it, so I never saw it. However the main story coming out of Europe about AZ is that delivery to the EU may be short so the EU's response is to ban all exports of vaccines manufactured in the bloc.

 

Which it will continue to do. I don't see an end to this covid nightmare. We are going to have to live with it, .....unless it mutates into a real people killer that wipes out the human race ?

 

Cool thought bro.

 

I don’t think it’s ever in a viruses interest to do that? And generally the more deadly the virus the more easier it is to contain?

 

Firstly, if surveillance is on point and local authorities are vigilant and prepared to act swiftly to contain outbreaks, there's no need to vaccinate the whole planet.

The other thing is Covid is no more likely than any other virus to mutate massively, it's all incremental changes. Lots of the common traits will remain. That means the efficacy of existing vaccines may be reduced but isn't very likely to be reduced to zero in the blink of an eye. A lot of cases will still be prevented even if a vaccine drops from 75% effective to 40%.

It's worth pointing out that's the opposite of the normal trend with viruses, which mutate generally to become less deadly but more transmissible. The virus' existence is threatened if it kills all viable hosts.

 

Viruses aren't alive, like bacteria are, however you are right that a very deadly virus with high mortality will die out if it kills quicker than it can be transmitted.

 

No it isn't but viruses don't always act in their own best interests. With this virus already dangerous, and so widespread, there will be many many variations, and given it is so widespread it will be difficult to quickly identify which variants are the most dangerous. Most will be milder but more contagious but will undoubtedly be more dangerous.

 

So Sth African strain won't reach us then ? You think the Brazilian won't too ? You think others won't or maybe already have ? This virus is too contagious to contain without permanent self isolation and border control....which can't happen.

See above. The virus is already dangerous and very widespread. Virus mutations don't always work in their own best interests. If a strain becomes too deadly it kills all its potential hosts and the virus dies out. That would be a shame for the human race but still, we had a good run.....

 

I'm writing the movie as we speak.....shame there will be no-one around to see it

 

The point is that wouldn’t happen, SARS had a 10% mortality rate but hardly spread anywhere, because it incapacitated its victims who couldn’t move around and spread it. The real danger/issue with Covid is asymptomatic spread and people going about their life spreading it here there and everywhere. You can’t do that effectively if you’re bed bound/dying.

 

Maybe you should pop out and have a look at the deer in your garden, TUT?

 

Interesting read on the BBC https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-55756452

The Chinese had a long time to do something about it, gagging doctors/hospitals, lying about transmission, withholding data etc., they easily could have contained and alerted WHO much earlier.

They are a despicably run country, it's not to say that the virus wouldn't have got out of China, it certainly did as retesting of samples showed that someone in France had it in late December 2019 who had recently been in Wuhan. Last week I read that the Chinese are pedalling a story that it was likely that the virus was imported, possibly from meat from the US. Obviously this is unlikely as there would have been a US outbreak first. I don't think the outside world is under any illusion that it started in or near Wuhan, it was either a species jump in the wet markets (which should be banned), some explorer in a bat cave somehow picked it up (not much anyone could do about that) or it was inadvertently released from the virus lab in the city.

 

You can if you're fine for 3-4 days before getting any symptoms while you pass it on and then bed bound/dying a week later.

 

Rabbits this morning too. A pair, which gives a worrying prospect for the future.

 

I wouldn't worry. You won't be around to see the invasion.

 

On the contrary, I'll be isolated in my bunker, living off rabbit meat and asparagus and nettle soup

 

Are you saying I probably shouldn't have bothered to buy a new lawnmower last week?

 

If you haven’t, watch the ITV documentary Outbreak, it was on last week. They basically ignored it almost completely, and let millions travel over Chinese New Year and new year. It pretty much seems like they purposefully let it get out of the country before they did anything about it.

 

Absolutely not. There's no evidence lawnmowers can catch Covid and so I can confidently predict it will go on to lead a long and happy life.

 

I haven't seen it, I'll look at that this week.