Leon said:

Selebian said:

ozymandias said:

Leon said:

Flatlander said:

NerysHughes said:

Leon said:

NerysHughes said:

Leon said:

JonathanD said:

TimT said:

JonathanD said:

Pulpstar said:

MaxPB said:

kinabalu said:

Leon said:

A major outbreak of the Boerbug in Austria. Not good. Suggests it is embedded in central Europe, and spreading

An OXAZ vaccinated UK population will be protected against our strain but less so against the SA. The SA will thus have a path to dominance and this, I gather, is a worry, although obviously not an argument for not vaccinating.

It's much less of a worry than is being made out by the news.

Everyone that's had OxAz can get a booster shot in the Autumn/early 2021, no worries.

It's not that its a worry but 1 week ago it was very likely that the UKs AZ vaccinated population would have been able to travel freely from early summer without a care in the world. Now, while we may be able to drive down cases in the UK through immunisation, we will still have to exist in a high state of lockdown to prevent the SA strain growing here.

Essentially we seem to be back to where we were before the AZ vaccine arrived, with only those having had the Pfizer vaccine looking like they will have enough immunity.

Having protection against severe disease and death is hardly back where we were before the vaccine.

We've yet to see performance data of the AZ vaccine for the more elderly population but hopefully you are right.

However, I expect that the restrictions the UK experiences this summer will be more onerous than the ones we had last summer, so in that sense we are back to the beginning.

Yes, unless this outbreak in central Europe fizzles out (and that is possible, inshallah) then I fear this means a considerably longer lockdown; maybe, in some form, until the autumn - when we have plentiful tweaked vaccines that defeat the SA Bug? Also closed borders for much if not all of the year.

What the F does that do to the economy, or indeed, to us?

Remember that the SA study showed that previous infection with Old Covid provides no immunity against SA Covid. So everybody whose already had it could get it again (as happened, perhaps, in Manaus?). It has serious implications.

The one thing you are missing is that the number of new cases in South Africa has collapsed from 20,000 a day a month ago to 2,000 a day now. So the SA Variant does not seem to last long.

I'm not missing it at all. I have mentioned it several times the past couple of weeks. It is promising, if somewhat inexplicable.

Some say it is herd immunity, others an effective lockdown, a third explanation is that this new variant just fizzles away. Clearly, the third answer is hugely preferable.

That level of decrease indicates to me it must be the third answer. All these new variants infect quickly and disappear quickly.

During the first wave in Europe despite the very strict lockdown it took weeks for the numbers to fall and then only gradually. These new varaints just seem to disappear.

I don't see how a virus strain can 'fizzle'. It hasn't got any momentum.

Either it can find someone to infect, or it can't (because of behaviour, immunity, or environment).

Lockdown, have it infect everybody susceptible, or vaccinate. What else is there?

It can mutate into something so innocuous you don't notice it. That's one kind of fizzling.

Sorry for the naïve schoolboy science on this but isn't it a case that viruses expend genetic "energy" when they mutate and that there's always a trade-off, genetically, between infectivity and lethality. Highly lethal viruses aren't normally highly contagious and vice-versa. HIV or Ebola, for example haven't mutated, thank-god, into highly transmissible airborne forms as the genetic price is too high.

With respect to C19 the more it mutates, the weaker it becomes?

I'm probably completely wrong....

Mutations are random. Could have any effect or no discernible effect.

For mutations that have an effect, evolutionary pressures select which thrive and which disappear.
Mutation(s) leading to:

greater infectivity -> successful strain (all other things being equal, it gets into more people)

greater risk of death/severe symptoms -> depends (irrelevant if after infectious phase, makes less successful if before/during infectious phase as it cuts short infectious phase)

So, over time you'd expect more infectious versions to appear (although what 'more infectious' means can vary - a version that evades acquired immunity or vaccinations could be 'more infectious' than the original strain is now even if less infectious than the original strain was originally). Simply, if something is better at infecting, it will reach more people and there will be more of it.

More severe versions are less likely to prosper as severity could likely interfere with infectiousness as people die, isolate or are treated. But if a more severe version developed that didn't interfere with infectiousness, then there's no reason it should not prosper too (other than likely increase in human efforts to conquer it)

You seem to know your stuff, could you tell this layman: how common is it for viruses to mutate so that they can reinfect people who have already had a case? As seems to be the situation with the SA Mutation. Is this unusual?

I don't remember any boffins warning us this might happen. But maybe I just missed it. Or maybe it is a genuinely unexpected development?

Every second, third, etc time you catch the flu you’ve been infected by a mutated form of a disease you’ve had before.

The reason we need a new flu vaccine annually is precisely because the thing mutates all the time.

So, the fact that this virus might mutate was entirely to be expected. Indeed, so much so that the medical establishment might have thought this would be entirely obvious & not bothered to mention it...

Phil said:

Leon said:

ozymandias said:

Leon said:

Flatlander said:

NerysHughes said:

Leon said:

NerysHughes said:

Leon said:

JonathanD said:

TimT said:

JonathanD said:

Pulpstar said:

MaxPB said:

kinabalu said:

Leon said:

A major outbreak of the Boerbug in Austria. Not good. Suggests it is embedded in central Europe, and spreading

An OXAZ vaccinated UK population will be protected against our strain but less so against the SA. The SA will thus have a path to dominance and this, I gather, is a worry, although obviously not an argument for not vaccinating.

It's much less of a worry than is being made out by the news.

Everyone that's had OxAz can get a booster shot in the Autumn/early 2021, no worries.

It's not that its a worry but 1 week ago it was very likely that the UKs AZ vaccinated population would have been able to travel freely from early summer without a care in the world. Now, while we may be able to drive down cases in the UK through immunisation, we will still have to exist in a high state of lockdown to prevent the SA strain growing here.

Essentially we seem to be back to where we were before the AZ vaccine arrived, with only those having had the Pfizer vaccine looking like they will have enough immunity.

Having protection against severe disease and death is hardly back where we were before the vaccine.

We've yet to see performance data of the AZ vaccine for the more elderly population but hopefully you are right.

However, I expect that the restrictions the UK experiences this summer will be more onerous than the ones we had last summer, so in that sense we are back to the beginning.

Yes, unless this outbreak in central Europe fizzles out (and that is possible, inshallah) then I fear this means a considerably longer lockdown; maybe, in some form, until the autumn - when we have plentiful tweaked vaccines that defeat the SA Bug? Also closed borders for much if not all of the year.

What the F does that do to the economy, or indeed, to us?

Remember that the SA study showed that previous infection with Old Covid provides no immunity against SA Covid. So everybody whose already had it could get it again (as happened, perhaps, in Manaus?). It has serious implications.

The one thing you are missing is that the number of new cases in South Africa has collapsed from 20,000 a day a month ago to 2,000 a day now. So the SA Variant does not seem to last long.

I'm not missing it at all. I have mentioned it several times the past couple of weeks. It is promising, if somewhat inexplicable.

Some say it is herd immunity, others an effective lockdown, a third explanation is that this new variant just fizzles away. Clearly, the third answer is hugely preferable.

That level of decrease indicates to me it must be the third answer. All these new variants infect quickly and disappear quickly.

During the first wave in Europe despite the very strict lockdown it took weeks for the numbers to fall and then only gradually. These new varaints just seem to disappear.

I don't see how a virus strain can 'fizzle'. It hasn't got any momentum.

Either it can find someone to infect, or it can't (because of behaviour, immunity, or environment).

Lockdown, have it infect everybody susceptible, or vaccinate. What else is there?

It can mutate into something so innocuous you don't notice it. That's one kind of fizzling.

Sorry for the naïve schoolboy science on this but isn't it a case that viruses expend genetic "energy" when they mutate and that there's always a trade-off, genetically, between infectivity and lethality. Highly lethal viruses aren't normally highly contagious and vice-versa. HIV or Ebola, for example haven't mutated, thank-god, into highly transmissible airborne forms as the genetic price is too high.

With respect to C19 the more it mutates, the weaker it becomes?

I'm probably completely wrong....

I have no more expertise than you, but that is my understanding of how viruses "normally" behave, but C19 is possibly abnormal, in that it is mutating into more transmissible and POTENTIALLY (we don't know yet) more lethal variants.

It already has a USP in its ability to transmit asymptomatically.

Here's the scientific dispute about increased lethality:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-55779171

There’s no particular bias towards non-lethality in the mutations a virus undergoes.

There is (obviously) a bias towards greater infectiousness in the virus mutations you’re likely to be exposed to & greater infectiousness tends to go along with a longer period of being asymptomatic. Sometimes that’s because the infection is less lethal, so the host survives longer or doesn’t die at all. But a mutation that increases the viral load of the victims breathe at the expense of lifetime might be just as effective!

One reason extant viruses tend to be less lethal over time might simply be that selection pressure on the infected population (i.e. us) has eliminated all the people who suffered the worst effects of infection by those vectors. Back in Tudor times, "the sweat" spread through England in waves, often killing in a day. Nowadays, we’re not even sure what kind of disease "the sweat" was! Presumably it killed off everyone that was vulnerable to it & either the remainder then provided sufficient herd immunity to eliminate the disease altogether, or it remains as one of the infectious, but relatively harmless infections that we all get in our lifetimes.

Very cogent and clear, thankyou.

It seems to me there is a *teleological* pressure on the virus not to become completely lethal, and kill 100% of its hosts, as it will then immediately die out itself. However I am also aware the virus is not sentient (PROBABLY: looking at you, China) and it does not gaze ahead to see its prospects, only to think "Oops, I'm so good I've killed everyone, including me"

Viruses are the strangest things. The more I think about them, the odder they get. Are they even alive? They exist on the edge of rationality.

MaxPB said:

Flatlander said:

MaxPB said:

Leon said:

MaxPB said:

Pulpstar said:

The saffer version seems vaccine resistant, previous infection resistant and leads to worse outcomes but how transmissible is it ?
Perhaps less than the Kent version maybe.

If they're competing for different host bodies then it may not matter. What we really need to see is data on severe symptoms, hospitalisation and death for it against current vaccines and prior infection. If it just results in 0.1% of people getting severe symptoms, 0.05% needing hospital and almost no on dying then it's not such a big deal. If it results in 5% getting severe symptoms, 2.5% needing hospital and 0.5% dying we have a big problem.

Another problem is that once we vaccinate everyone (half of them with AZ), we will have crushed the UK Variant.... only to leave ample room for the SA Variant to reinfect half the country.

We really really need to know if AZ is still effective in the elderly against SA C19

We will find out in due course and chances are by then we'll have mutation busting booster shots available from Novavax and J&J and more on the way from AZ. We're conducting an efficacy study of mixing vaccine types so we can use variable boosters rather than need to give people two doses of a new vaccine.

Honestly, the government has done a lot of joined up thinking on this and I'm really impressed by the way we're trying to stay one step ahead of the virus with vaccines.

I wonder if they might give J&J as a booster for AZ if it arrives early enough. Similar, but with a different vector.

No doubt to lots of complaints about them using 'off label' methods.

Hence the trial of mixing vaccines and vectors.

Yes, I understand it is being trialled, but not with a full phase 3 type study I don't think? No doubt it won't a big enough trial for the usual suspects.

Perhaps we'll all end up getting one of everything...

FF43 said:

..

Richard_Nabavi said:

CarlottaVance said:

Richard_Nabavi said:

CarlottaVance said:

Richard_Nabavi said:

CarlottaVance said:

Scott_xP said:

https://twitter.com/JoannaPartridge/status/1359135105638424576

The importer of stuff from Asia does not understand "Rules of Origin"?

They understand very well, that's why they are thinking of moving their distribution hub to the EU, at the cost of around 1,000 UK jobs.

An example of those sunny uplands visible before you.

If they understood them they would have moved before the transition period ended, rather than them come as a shock afterwards!

Not at all, you seem to have forgotten that our half-wit of a PM left about three working days gap between publishing the trade agreement and it coming into effect. No one knew what the rules of origin were going to be before that.

Admittedly they might have been very stupid to believe our PM's assurances before that that everything would be OK. But no company would be happy doing a hugely expensive and disruptive revamp of its distribution network when there was no transparency as to what the rules would be and whether the revamp would be necessary. Especially not in the middle of a massive worldwide pandemic and in the run-up to Christmas - timings which were 100% the fault of Boris Johnson and his government.

If he thought he could import shoes from Asia and sell them to the EU as British life must be a long series of unpleasant surprises....

Well, they could have moved the distribution centre earlier. Would that have been better for the UK? The crucial point isn't whether the UK jobs should have been lost a few months earlier, it's the fact that have to be lost at all.

I think JD Sports approach is sensible. People paying attention knew before B Day that Brexit would be bad for anyone with cross-border supply chains, as it is bad in so many other ways. But if your business model depends on those supply chains you would want to understand the full implications before making your move. This, JD Sports has done, by shifting operations from the UK to the EU, as many other businesses have also done, or are doing. Not great for the UK, but sensible for the companies.

Yep. As @Philip_Thompson might say, just teething troubles of Brexit and entirely to be expected.

Whether it was also to be expected that the firms concerned would decide, having looked at the situation ex-post, to leave the UK @Philip_Thompson only knows.

Good riddance, I'm sure he will say.

Stark_Dawning said:

CarlottaVance said:

Richard_Nabavi said:

CarlottaVance said:

Scott_xP said:

https://twitter.com/JoannaPartridge/status/1359135105638424576

The importer of stuff from Asia does not understand "Rules of Origin"?

They understand very well, that's why they are thinking of moving their distribution hub to the EU, at the cost of around 1,000 UK jobs.

An example of those sunny uplands visible before you.

If they understood them they would have moved before the transition period ended, rather than them come as a shock afterwards!

Nonsense. Because of Boris's pantomime - pretending there might be No Deal up to the eleventh hour - no one could have a clue what was actually required until Brexit was upon us.

Yes. There was a real world cost to the No Deal theatrics. But the partisan political gain was deemed more important.

MarqueeMark said:

CarlottaVance said:

Scotland to quarantine ALL International travellers from Monday (not just the "Red-List" countries):

https://twitter.com/SkyNews/status/1359156489919860742?s=20

Which looks like one flight a day at Aberdeen from Bergen and another from Doha at Edinburgh....

Meanwhile, anybody flying into Newcastle or Leeds or Manchester and then getting a train north.....

They'll be obliged to quarantine too - by what method or measures, not yet clear.

Richard_Nabavi said:

This is pretty extraordinary, and encouraging:

https://twitter.com/andrew_croxford/status/1359161173908860941

The Chinese have activated the kill-switch on the virus? Ahem. Joke. Obviously.

Leon said:

Phil said:

Leon said:

ozymandias said:

Leon said:

Flatlander said:

NerysHughes said:

Leon said:

NerysHughes said:

Leon said:

JonathanD said:

TimT said:

JonathanD said:

Pulpstar said:

MaxPB said:

kinabalu said:

Leon said:

A major outbreak of the Boerbug in Austria. Not good. Suggests it is embedded in central Europe, and spreading

An OXAZ vaccinated UK population will be protected against our strain but less so against the SA. The SA will thus have a path to dominance and this, I gather, is a worry, although obviously not an argument for not vaccinating.

It's much less of a worry than is being made out by the news.

Everyone that's had OxAz can get a booster shot in the Autumn/early 2021, no worries.

It's not that its a worry but 1 week ago it was very likely that the UKs AZ vaccinated population would have been able to travel freely from early summer without a care in the world. Now, while we may be able to drive down cases in the UK through immunisation, we will still have to exist in a high state of lockdown to prevent the SA strain growing here.

Essentially we seem to be back to where we were before the AZ vaccine arrived, with only those having had the Pfizer vaccine looking like they will have enough immunity.

Having protection against severe disease and death is hardly back where we were before the vaccine.

We've yet to see performance data of the AZ vaccine for the more elderly population but hopefully you are right.

However, I expect that the restrictions the UK experiences this summer will be more onerous than the ones we had last summer, so in that sense we are back to the beginning.

Yes, unless this outbreak in central Europe fizzles out (and that is possible, inshallah) then I fear this means a considerably longer lockdown; maybe, in some form, until the autumn - when we have plentiful tweaked vaccines that defeat the SA Bug? Also closed borders for much if not all of the year.

What the F does that do to the economy, or indeed, to us?

Remember that the SA study showed that previous infection with Old Covid provides no immunity against SA Covid. So everybody whose already had it could get it again (as happened, perhaps, in Manaus?). It has serious implications.

The one thing you are missing is that the number of new cases in South Africa has collapsed from 20,000 a day a month ago to 2,000 a day now. So the SA Variant does not seem to last long.

I'm not missing it at all. I have mentioned it several times the past couple of weeks. It is promising, if somewhat inexplicable.

Some say it is herd immunity, others an effective lockdown, a third explanation is that this new variant just fizzles away. Clearly, the third answer is hugely preferable.

That level of decrease indicates to me it must be the third answer. All these new variants infect quickly and disappear quickly.

During the first wave in Europe despite the very strict lockdown it took weeks for the numbers to fall and then only gradually. These new varaints just seem to disappear.

I don't see how a virus strain can 'fizzle'. It hasn't got any momentum.

Either it can find someone to infect, or it can't (because of behaviour, immunity, or environment).

Lockdown, have it infect everybody susceptible, or vaccinate. What else is there?

It can mutate into something so innocuous you don't notice it. That's one kind of fizzling.

Sorry for the naïve schoolboy science on this but isn't it a case that viruses expend genetic "energy" when they mutate and that there's always a trade-off, genetically, between infectivity and lethality. Highly lethal viruses aren't normally highly contagious and vice-versa. HIV or Ebola, for example haven't mutated, thank-god, into highly transmissible airborne forms as the genetic price is too high.

With respect to C19 the more it mutates, the weaker it becomes?

I'm probably completely wrong....

I have no more expertise than you, but that is my understanding of how viruses "normally" behave, but C19 is possibly abnormal, in that it is mutating into more transmissible and POTENTIALLY (we don't know yet) more lethal variants.

It already has a USP in its ability to transmit asymptomatically.

Here's the scientific dispute about increased lethality:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-55779171

There’s no particular bias towards non-lethality in the mutations a virus undergoes.

There is (obviously) a bias towards greater infectiousness in the virus mutations you’re likely to be exposed to & greater infectiousness tends to go along with a longer period of being asymptomatic. Sometimes that’s because the infection is less lethal, so the host survives longer or doesn’t die at all. But a mutation that increases the viral load of the victims breathe at the expense of lifetime might be just as effective!

One reason extant viruses tend to be less lethal over time might simply be that selection pressure on the infected population (i.e. us) has eliminated all the people who suffered the worst effects of infection by those vectors. Back in Tudor times, "the sweat" spread through England in waves, often killing in a day. Nowadays, we’re not even sure what kind of disease "the sweat" was! Presumably it killed off everyone that was vulnerable to it & either the remainder then provided sufficient herd immunity to eliminate the disease altogether, or it remains as one of the infectious, but relatively harmless infections that we all get in our lifetimes.

Very cogent and clear, thankyou.

It seems to me there is a *teleological* pressure on the virus not to become completely lethal, and kill 100% of its hosts, as it will then immediately die out itself. However I am also aware the virus is not sentient (PROBABLY: looking at you, China) and it does not gaze ahead to see its prospects, only to think "Oops, I'm so good I've killed everyone, including me"

Viruses are the strangest things. The more I think about them, the odder they get. Are they even alive? They exist on the edge of rationality.

Yes, they are weird things! They’re evolution in it’s rawest form, perfectly capable both of wiping out host & virus simultaneously or, alternatively, co-existing for millennia.

CarlottaVance said:

MarqueeMark said:

CarlottaVance said:

Scotland to quarantine ALL International travellers from Monday (not just the "Red-List" countries):

https://twitter.com/SkyNews/status/1359156489919860742?s=20

Which looks like one flight a day at Aberdeen from Bergen and another from Doha at Edinburgh....

Meanwhile, anybody flying into Newcastle or Leeds or Manchester and then getting a train north.....

They'll be obliged to quarantine too - by what method or measures, not yet clear.

By passing the buck to England:

Those arriving into England for onward travel to Scotland “will have to isolate in a hotel in England”, the transport secretary said.

https://www.scotsman.com/health/coronavirus/incoming-travellers-scotland-will-face-quarantine-hotels-monday-3129278?r=8387

Not sure how that's going to work.....

Phil said:

Leon said:

Phil said:

Leon said:

Selebian said:

ozymandias said:

Leon said:

Flatlander said:

NerysHughes said:

Leon said:

NerysHughes said:

Leon said:

JonathanD said:

TimT said:

JonathanD said:

Pulpstar said:

MaxPB said:

kinabalu said:

Leon said:

A major outbreak of the Boerbug in Austria. Not good. Suggests it is embedded in central Europe, and spreading

An OXAZ vaccinated UK population will be protected against our strain but less so against the SA. The SA will thus have a path to dominance and this, I gather, is a worry, although obviously not an argument for not vaccinating.

It's much less of a worry than is being made out by the news.

Everyone that's had OxAz can get a booster shot in the Autumn/early 2021, no worries.

It's not that its a worry but 1 week ago it was very likely that the UKs AZ vaccinated population would have been able to travel freely from early summer without a care in the world. Now, while we may be able to drive down cases in the UK through immunisation, we will still have to exist in a high state of lockdown to prevent the SA strain growing here.

Essentially we seem to be back to where we were before the AZ vaccine arrived, with only those having had the Pfizer vaccine looking like they will have enough immunity.

Having protection against severe disease and death is hardly back where we were before the vaccine.

We've yet to see performance data of the AZ vaccine for the more elderly population but hopefully you are right.

However, I expect that the restrictions the UK experiences this summer will be more onerous than the ones we had last summer, so in that sense we are back to the beginning.

Yes, unless this outbreak in central Europe fizzles out (and that is possible, inshallah) then I fear this means a considerably longer lockdown; maybe, in some form, until the autumn - when we have plentiful tweaked vaccines that defeat the SA Bug? Also closed borders for much if not all of the year.

What the F does that do to the economy, or indeed, to us?

Remember that the SA study showed that previous infection with Old Covid provides no immunity against SA Covid. So everybody whose already had it could get it again (as happened, perhaps, in Manaus?). It has serious implications.

The one thing you are missing is that the number of new cases in South Africa has collapsed from 20,000 a day a month ago to 2,000 a day now. So the SA Variant does not seem to last long.

I'm not missing it at all. I have mentioned it several times the past couple of weeks. It is promising, if somewhat inexplicable.

Some say it is herd immunity, others an effective lockdown, a third explanation is that this new variant just fizzles away. Clearly, the third answer is hugely preferable.

That level of decrease indicates to me it must be the third answer. All these new variants infect quickly and disappear quickly.

During the first wave in Europe despite the very strict lockdown it took weeks for the numbers to fall and then only gradually. These new varaints just seem to disappear.

I don't see how a virus strain can 'fizzle'. It hasn't got any momentum.

Either it can find someone to infect, or it can't (because of behaviour, immunity, or environment).

Lockdown, have it infect everybody susceptible, or vaccinate. What else is there?

It can mutate into something so innocuous you don't notice it. That's one kind of fizzling.

Sorry for the naïve schoolboy science on this but isn't it a case that viruses expend genetic "energy" when they mutate and that there's always a trade-off, genetically, between infectivity and lethality. Highly lethal viruses aren't normally highly contagious and vice-versa. HIV or Ebola, for example haven't mutated, thank-god, into highly transmissible airborne forms as the genetic price is too high.

With respect to C19 the more it mutates, the weaker it becomes?

I'm probably completely wrong....

Mutations are random. Could have any effect or no discernible effect.

For mutations that have an effect, evolutionary pressures select which thrive and which disappear.
Mutation(s) leading to:

greater infectivity -> successful strain (all other things being equal, it gets into more people)

greater risk of death/severe symptoms -> depends (irrelevant if after infectious phase, makes less successful if before/during infectious phase as it cuts short infectious phase)

So, over time you'd expect more infectious versions to appear (although what 'more infectious' means can vary - a version that evades acquired immunity or vaccinations could be 'more infectious' than the original strain is now even if less infectious than the original strain was originally). Simply, if something is better at infecting, it will reach more people and there will be more of it.

More severe versions are less likely to prosper as severity could likely interfere with infectiousness as people die, isolate or are treated. But if a more severe version developed that didn't interfere with infectiousness, then there's no reason it should not prosper too (other than likely increase in human efforts to conquer it)

You seem to know your stuff, could you tell this layman: how common is it for viruses to mutate so that they can reinfect people who have already had a case? As seems to be the situation with the SA Mutation. Is this unusual?

I don't remember any boffins warning us this might happen. But maybe I just missed it. Or maybe it is a genuinely unexpected development?

Every second, third, etc time you catch the flu you’ve been infected by a mutated form of a disease you’ve had before.

The reason we need a new flu vaccine annually is precisely because the thing mutates all the time.

So, the fact that this virus might mutate was entirely to be expected. Indeed, so much so that the medical establishment might have thought this would be entirely obvious & not bothered to mention it...

Ah, ta.

Tho that does make me wonder why so many apparent Twitter experts are horrified by the reinfectivity of the SA variant. If it was entirely to be expected....

Some mutation was to be expected. A new form that’s both significantly more infectious /and/ evades at least some of the vaccines before we’d even started in on significant vaccination programs is doubly bad luck though.

Convalescent plasma does increase the odds. Also we know way more about this virus during the pandemic than previous. Maybe spanish flu had a couple of mutations during the course of the virus but we just never found them ?

contrarian said:

CarlottaVance said:

I'm sure they'll speed up:

https://twitter.com/lefoudubaron/status/1359161426271756291?s=20

I don't know why you or anyone else is laughing.

France at least had the courage recently not to go into a full lockdown, citing the collateral damage, and their children are in school. And their cases are falling.

If you can bear to read the grim stats on the untold and lasting damage we are doing to our children over these lockdowns, Ross Clark has them in the Spectator.

Meanwhile Sage members are all over the media postulating a future of everlasting in and out of lockdown see saws.

The ongoing school closures are an avoidable catastrophe borne of rank cowardice on the part of our government, and one I personally cannot ever forgive them for.

They'll be living a half life until 2026(!) while the UK and other fast movers will be looking in the rear view mirror saying "never again".

TheScreamingEagles said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

I presume the Indian cricket commentaries are still talking about India in with a good chance of winning the 1st Test.

We missed it in the UK but in the after match analysis the reason why England won was because

1) England had come straight from Sri Lanka and were used to playing on turning pitches whilst India had come from bouncy pitches in Australia.

2) India's last test in Australia was such a heroic victory that it took so much out of India, because it was India's greatest every away test performance.

They make that American EU journo bloke look impartial.

MaxPB said:

contrarian said:

CarlottaVance said:

I'm sure they'll speed up:

https://twitter.com/lefoudubaron/status/1359161426271756291?s=20

I don't know why you or anyone else is laughing.

France at least had the courage recently not to go into a full lockdown, citing the collateral damage, and their children are in school. And their cases are falling.

If you can bear to read the grim stats on the untold and lasting damage we are doing to our children over these lockdowns, Ross Clark has them in the Spectator.

Meanwhile Sage members are all over the media postulating a future of everlasting in and out of lockdown see saws.

The ongoing school closures are an avoidable catastrophe borne of rank cowardice on the part of our government, and one I personally cannot ever forgive them for.

They'll be living a half life until 2026(!) while the UK and other fast movers will be looking in the rear view mirror saying "never again".

Their children are in school.

Ours are rotting at home.

And its going to continue at least for another month.

Those are the facts.

contrarian said:

CarlottaVance said:

Scotland to quarantine ALL International travellers from Monday (not just the "Red-List" countries):

https://twitter.com/SkyNews/status/1359156489919860742?s=20

Which looks like one flight a day at Aberdeen from Bergen and another from Doha at Edinburgh....

Is it me or are the latest travel restrictions into the UK essentially everything a deep purple UKipper could wish for?

It's a point. I do sense that for some of the more extreme "anti-globalists" of both left and right Covid is in the toolkit for closing borders rather than the other way round.

FrancisUrquhart said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

I presume the Indian cricket commentaries are still talking about India in with a good chance of winning the 1st Test.

We missed it in the UK but in the after match analysis the reason why England won was because

1) England had come straight from Sri Lanka and were used to playing on turning pitches whilst India had come from bouncy pitches in Australia.

2) India's last test in Australia was such a heroic victory that it took so much out of India, because it was India's greatest every away test performance.

They make that American EU journo bloke look impartial.

Wait until an Indian scores a century or they win a match.

This first test will seem like the good old days.

I really did miss the Sky coverage, at least they have objective commentators.

Although we might have heard the last from Michael Holding, which is a great shame.


https://www.loopjamaica.com/content/michael-holding-retire-cricket-commentary

Leon said:

Phil said:

Leon said:

Selebian said:

ozymandias said:

Leon said:

Flatlander said:

NerysHughes said:

Leon said:

NerysHughes said:

Leon said:

JonathanD said:

TimT said:

JonathanD said:

Pulpstar said:

MaxPB said:

kinabalu said:

Leon said:

A major outbreak of the Boerbug in Austria. Not good. Suggests it is embedded in central Europe, and spreading

An OXAZ vaccinated UK population will be protected against our strain but less so against the SA. The SA will thus have a path to dominance and this, I gather, is a worry, although obviously not an argument for not vaccinating.

It's much less of a worry than is being made out by the news.

Everyone that's had OxAz can get a booster shot in the Autumn/early 2021, no worries.

It's not that its a worry but 1 week ago it was very likely that the UKs AZ vaccinated population would have been able to travel freely from early summer without a care in the world. Now, while we may be able to drive down cases in the UK through immunisation, we will still have to exist in a high state of lockdown to prevent the SA strain growing here.

Essentially we seem to be back to where we were before the AZ vaccine arrived, with only those having had the Pfizer vaccine looking like they will have enough immunity.

Having protection against severe disease and death is hardly back where we were before the vaccine.

We've yet to see performance data of the AZ vaccine for the more elderly population but hopefully you are right.

However, I expect that the restrictions the UK experiences this summer will be more onerous than the ones we had last summer, so in that sense we are back to the beginning.

Yes, unless this outbreak in central Europe fizzles out (and that is possible, inshallah) then I fear this means a considerably longer lockdown; maybe, in some form, until the autumn - when we have plentiful tweaked vaccines that defeat the SA Bug? Also closed borders for much if not all of the year.

What the F does that do to the economy, or indeed, to us?

Remember that the SA study showed that previous infection with Old Covid provides no immunity against SA Covid. So everybody whose already had it could get it again (as happened, perhaps, in Manaus?). It has serious implications.

The one thing you are missing is that the number of new cases in South Africa has collapsed from 20,000 a day a month ago to 2,000 a day now. So the SA Variant does not seem to last long.

I'm not missing it at all. I have mentioned it several times the past couple of weeks. It is promising, if somewhat inexplicable.

Some say it is herd immunity, others an effective lockdown, a third explanation is that this new variant just fizzles away. Clearly, the third answer is hugely preferable.

That level of decrease indicates to me it must be the third answer. All these new variants infect quickly and disappear quickly.

During the first wave in Europe despite the very strict lockdown it took weeks for the numbers to fall and then only gradually. These new varaints just seem to disappear.

I don't see how a virus strain can 'fizzle'. It hasn't got any momentum.

Either it can find someone to infect, or it can't (because of behaviour, immunity, or environment).

Lockdown, have it infect everybody susceptible, or vaccinate. What else is there?

It can mutate into something so innocuous you don't notice it. That's one kind of fizzling.

Sorry for the naïve schoolboy science on this but isn't it a case that viruses expend genetic "energy" when they mutate and that there's always a trade-off, genetically, between infectivity and lethality. Highly lethal viruses aren't normally highly contagious and vice-versa. HIV or Ebola, for example haven't mutated, thank-god, into highly transmissible airborne forms as the genetic price is too high.

With respect to C19 the more it mutates, the weaker it becomes?

I'm probably completely wrong....

Mutations are random. Could have any effect or no discernible effect.

For mutations that have an effect, evolutionary pressures select which thrive and which disappear.
Mutation(s) leading to:

greater infectivity -> successful strain (all other things being equal, it gets into more people)

greater risk of death/severe symptoms -> depends (irrelevant if after infectious phase, makes less successful if before/during infectious phase as it cuts short infectious phase)

So, over time you'd expect more infectious versions to appear (although what 'more infectious' means can vary - a version that evades acquired immunity or vaccinations could be 'more infectious' than the original strain is now even if less infectious than the original strain was originally). Simply, if something is better at infecting, it will reach more people and there will be more of it.

More severe versions are less likely to prosper as severity could likely interfere with infectiousness as people die, isolate or are treated. But if a more severe version developed that didn't interfere with infectiousness, then there's no reason it should not prosper too (other than likely increase in human efforts to conquer it)

You seem to know your stuff, could you tell this layman: how common is it for viruses to mutate so that they can reinfect people who have already had a case? As seems to be the situation with the SA Mutation. Is this unusual?

I don't remember any boffins warning us this might happen. But maybe I just missed it. Or maybe it is a genuinely unexpected development?

Every second, third, etc time you catch the flu you’ve been infected by a mutated form of a disease you’ve had before.

The reason we need a new flu vaccine annually is precisely because the thing mutates all the time.

So, the fact that this virus might mutate was entirely to be expected. Indeed, so much so that the medical establishment might have thought this would be entirely obvious & not bothered to mention it...

Ah, ta.

Tho that does make me wonder why so many apparent Twitter experts are horrified by the reinfectivity of the SA variant. If it was entirely to be expected....

Coronaviruses apparently have a proofreading mechanism that should slow down mutations. Doesn't look like it was enough though ...

Richard_Nabavi said:

YBarddCwsc said:

Richard_Nabavi said:

YBarddCwsc said:

Richard_Nabavi said:

YBarddCwsc said:

Try googling Tube-Alloys. Or Lamb Shift.

Oxford physics was rejuvenated by the efforts of Lindemann in the 1940s, before that it had sunk into the doldrums.

Seriously, if Oxford are going to rename the Chair, they should ask for more than 700k.

(BTW, I think R. Nabavi was an Oxford physicist).

Indeed, in my spare time (which wasn't very much, given all the other competing demands on the time of an undergraduate in the 70s..).

You mean sex and drugs ?

Not drugs in my case. Never had any appeal to me. (Wine, on the other hand...)

I prefer glue.

Interesting. Any particular appellation?

Substance contrôlée ?

TheScreamingEagles said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

I presume the Indian cricket commentaries are still talking about India in with a good chance of winning the 1st Test.

We missed it in the UK but in the after match analysis the reason why England won was because

1) England had come straight from Sri Lanka and were used to playing on turning pitches whilst India had come from bouncy pitches in Australia.

2) India's last test in Australia was such a heroic victory that it took so much out of India, because it was India's greatest every away test performance.

They make that American EU journo bloke look impartial.

Wait until an Indian scores a century or they win a match.

This first test will seem like the good old days.

I really did miss the Sky coverage, at least they have objective commentators.

Although we might have heard the last from Michael Holding, which is a great shame.


https://www.loopjamaica.com/content/michael-holding-retire-cricket-commentary

Honestly. I think it is time. He really doesn't have any grasp on the modern game and it often feels like he doesn't really know who are the upcoming players, their strengths, weaknesses etc. It was the same with Botham, the game has passed them by and they don't work at getting up to speed.

Their analysis of Archer vs Australia was he should basically bowl fast, bowl faster, just bowl as fast is humanly possible.....

TheScreamingEagles said:

Well I am shocked.

https://twitter.com/aljwhite/status/1359135283632091142

Eustice will be threatening to board the boats of the UK Shellfish Industry if they don't shut up.

NerysHughes said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

Sharon Feinstein, who lives in Islington, north London, claims she walked through the terminal following a trip to Johannesburg, where the mutant strain is rife.

Ms Feinstein landed yesterday after visiting her mother...Ms Feinstein, a freelance journalist

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9239721/Boris-Johnson-urged-toughen-border-controls.html

So you admit breaking the rules?

The mutant strain is rife??? Down 90% in 4 weeks

Have the Daily Mail classified it as "RIFE" or just "rife"? You can almost hear Chris Morris in DM headlines these days.

Phil said:

Leon said:

Phil said:

Leon said:

ozymandias said:

Leon said:

Flatlander said:

NerysHughes said:

Leon said:

NerysHughes said:

Leon said:

JonathanD said:

TimT said:

JonathanD said:

Pulpstar said:

MaxPB said:

kinabalu said:

Leon said:

A major outbreak of the Boerbug in Austria. Not good. Suggests it is embedded in central Europe, and spreading

An OXAZ vaccinated UK population will be protected against our strain but less so against the SA. The SA will thus have a path to dominance and this, I gather, is a worry, although obviously not an argument for not vaccinating.

It's much less of a worry than is being made out by the news.

Everyone that's had OxAz can get a booster shot in the Autumn/early 2021, no worries.

It's not that its a worry but 1 week ago it was very likely that the UKs AZ vaccinated population would have been able to travel freely from early summer without a care in the world. Now, while we may be able to drive down cases in the UK through immunisation, we will still have to exist in a high state of lockdown to prevent the SA strain growing here.

Essentially we seem to be back to where we were before the AZ vaccine arrived, with only those having had the Pfizer vaccine looking like they will have enough immunity.

Having protection against severe disease and death is hardly back where we were before the vaccine.

We've yet to see performance data of the AZ vaccine for the more elderly population but hopefully you are right.

However, I expect that the restrictions the UK experiences this summer will be more onerous than the ones we had last summer, so in that sense we are back to the beginning.

Yes, unless this outbreak in central Europe fizzles out (and that is possible, inshallah) then I fear this means a considerably longer lockdown; maybe, in some form, until the autumn - when we have plentiful tweaked vaccines that defeat the SA Bug? Also closed borders for much if not all of the year.

What the F does that do to the economy, or indeed, to us?

Remember that the SA study showed that previous infection with Old Covid provides no immunity against SA Covid. So everybody whose already had it could get it again (as happened, perhaps, in Manaus?). It has serious implications.

The one thing you are missing is that the number of new cases in South Africa has collapsed from 20,000 a day a month ago to 2,000 a day now. So the SA Variant does not seem to last long.

I'm not missing it at all. I have mentioned it several times the past couple of weeks. It is promising, if somewhat inexplicable.

Some say it is herd immunity, others an effective lockdown, a third explanation is that this new variant just fizzles away. Clearly, the third answer is hugely preferable.

That level of decrease indicates to me it must be the third answer. All these new variants infect quickly and disappear quickly.

During the first wave in Europe despite the very strict lockdown it took weeks for the numbers to fall and then only gradually. These new varaints just seem to disappear.

I don't see how a virus strain can 'fizzle'. It hasn't got any momentum.

Either it can find someone to infect, or it can't (because of behaviour, immunity, or environment).

Lockdown, have it infect everybody susceptible, or vaccinate. What else is there?

It can mutate into something so innocuous you don't notice it. That's one kind of fizzling.

Sorry for the naïve schoolboy science on this but isn't it a case that viruses expend genetic "energy" when they mutate and that there's always a trade-off, genetically, between infectivity and lethality. Highly lethal viruses aren't normally highly contagious and vice-versa. HIV or Ebola, for example haven't mutated, thank-god, into highly transmissible airborne forms as the genetic price is too high.

With respect to C19 the more it mutates, the weaker it becomes?

I'm probably completely wrong....

I have no more expertise than you, but that is my understanding of how viruses "normally" behave, but C19 is possibly abnormal, in that it is mutating into more transmissible and POTENTIALLY (we don't know yet) more lethal variants.

It already has a USP in its ability to transmit asymptomatically.

Here's the scientific dispute about increased lethality:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-55779171

There’s no particular bias towards non-lethality in the mutations a virus undergoes.

There is (obviously) a bias towards greater infectiousness in the virus mutations you’re likely to be exposed to & greater infectiousness tends to go along with a longer period of being asymptomatic. Sometimes that’s because the infection is less lethal, so the host survives longer or doesn’t die at all. But a mutation that increases the viral load of the victims breathe at the expense of lifetime might be just as effective!

One reason extant viruses tend to be less lethal over time might simply be that selection pressure on the infected population (i.e. us) has eliminated all the people who suffered the worst effects of infection by those vectors. Back in Tudor times, "the sweat" spread through England in waves, often killing in a day. Nowadays, we’re not even sure what kind of disease "the sweat" was! Presumably it killed off everyone that was vulnerable to it & either the remainder then provided sufficient herd immunity to eliminate the disease altogether, or it remains as one of the infectious, but relatively harmless infections that we all get in our lifetimes.

Very cogent and clear, thankyou.

It seems to me there is a *teleological* pressure on the virus not to become completely lethal, and kill 100% of its hosts, as it will then immediately die out itself. However I am also aware the virus is not sentient (PROBABLY: looking at you, China) and it does not gaze ahead to see its prospects, only to think "Oops, I'm so good I've killed everyone, including me"

Viruses are the strangest things. The more I think about them, the odder they get. Are they even alive? They exist on the edge of rationality.

Yes, they are weird things! They’re evolution in it’s rawest form, perfectly capable both of wiping out host & virus simultaneously or, alternatively, co-existing for millennia.

Fascinating and yet do no good in the world whatsoever unless I'm missing something. Quite like to see the back of.

TheScreamingEagles said:

Well I am shocked.

https://twitter.com/aljwhite/status/1359135283632091142

He (Eusless) described the rules as having no "scientific or technical justification"...
Which is true.

Strange, then, that his government happily signed an agreement which made them law.

The issues with the shellfish, j d sports, the Irish Sea border , and other trading problems with the EU in normal times would be very difficult for Boris and HMG, but in truth virtually nobody is listening as covid has taken over our lives

Of course, as well as covid UVDL ill-judged and frankly inexplicable error over A16 and trying to curtail vaccine exports has very obviously lost the moral high ground and was completely avoidable. I doubt Junckers would have fallen into the same trap and neither would Barnier

It is becoming apparent that Boris is getting credit for the vaccination success as those vaccinated feel relief that they are receiving vital protection

In truth, I expect covid and the financial implications to dominate political discourse and the longer it does then difficulties with the EU will largely fade as dissues are addressed and different markets open up

In many ways Boris is very fortunate to be still in office, but I would not bet on him being replaced anytime soon, and even leading his party into GE2024. I would not have said that last November-December

We are living through change the like of which none of us have experienced in our adult life.

I say that of course as someone who was born in WW2 with v bombs over our house in Greater Manchester

kinabalu said:

Phil said:

Leon said:

Phil said:

Leon said:

ozymandias said:

Leon said:

Flatlander said:

NerysHughes said:

Leon said:

NerysHughes said:

Leon said:

JonathanD said:

TimT said:

JonathanD said:

Pulpstar said:

MaxPB said:

kinabalu said:

Leon said:

A major outbreak of the Boerbug in Austria. Not good. Suggests it is embedded in central Europe, and spreading

An OXAZ vaccinated UK population will be protected against our strain but less so against the SA. The SA will thus have a path to dominance and this, I gather, is a worry, although obviously not an argument for not vaccinating.

It's much less of a worry than is being made out by the news.

Everyone that's had OxAz can get a booster shot in the Autumn/early 2021, no worries.

It's not that its a worry but 1 week ago it was very likely that the UKs AZ vaccinated population would have been able to travel freely from early summer without a care in the world. Now, while we may be able to drive down cases in the UK through immunisation, we will still have to exist in a high state of lockdown to prevent the SA strain growing here.

Essentially we seem to be back to where we were before the AZ vaccine arrived, with only those having had the Pfizer vaccine looking like they will have enough immunity.

Having protection against severe disease and death is hardly back where we were before the vaccine.

We've yet to see performance data of the AZ vaccine for the more elderly population but hopefully you are right.

However, I expect that the restrictions the UK experiences this summer will be more onerous than the ones we had last summer, so in that sense we are back to the beginning.

Yes, unless this outbreak in central Europe fizzles out (and that is possible, inshallah) then I fear this means a considerably longer lockdown; maybe, in some form, until the autumn - when we have plentiful tweaked vaccines that defeat the SA Bug? Also closed borders for much if not all of the year.

What the F does that do to the economy, or indeed, to us?

Remember that the SA study showed that previous infection with Old Covid provides no immunity against SA Covid. So everybody whose already had it could get it again (as happened, perhaps, in Manaus?). It has serious implications.

The one thing you are missing is that the number of new cases in South Africa has collapsed from 20,000 a day a month ago to 2,000 a day now. So the SA Variant does not seem to last long.

I'm not missing it at all. I have mentioned it several times the past couple of weeks. It is promising, if somewhat inexplicable.

Some say it is herd immunity, others an effective lockdown, a third explanation is that this new variant just fizzles away. Clearly, the third answer is hugely preferable.

That level of decrease indicates to me it must be the third answer. All these new variants infect quickly and disappear quickly.

During the first wave in Europe despite the very strict lockdown it took weeks for the numbers to fall and then only gradually. These new varaints just seem to disappear.

I don't see how a virus strain can 'fizzle'. It hasn't got any momentum.

Either it can find someone to infect, or it can't (because of behaviour, immunity, or environment).

Lockdown, have it infect everybody susceptible, or vaccinate. What else is there?

It can mutate into something so innocuous you don't notice it. That's one kind of fizzling.

Sorry for the naïve schoolboy science on this but isn't it a case that viruses expend genetic "energy" when they mutate and that there's always a trade-off, genetically, between infectivity and lethality. Highly lethal viruses aren't normally highly contagious and vice-versa. HIV or Ebola, for example haven't mutated, thank-god, into highly transmissible airborne forms as the genetic price is too high.

With respect to C19 the more it mutates, the weaker it becomes?

I'm probably completely wrong....

I have no more expertise than you, but that is my understanding of how viruses "normally" behave, but C19 is possibly abnormal, in that it is mutating into more transmissible and POTENTIALLY (we don't know yet) more lethal variants.

It already has a USP in its ability to transmit asymptomatically.

Here's the scientific dispute about increased lethality:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-55779171

There’s no particular bias towards non-lethality in the mutations a virus undergoes.

There is (obviously) a bias towards greater infectiousness in the virus mutations you’re likely to be exposed to & greater infectiousness tends to go along with a longer period of being asymptomatic. Sometimes that’s because the infection is less lethal, so the host survives longer or doesn’t die at all. But a mutation that increases the viral load of the victims breathe at the expense of lifetime might be just as effective!

One reason extant viruses tend to be less lethal over time might simply be that selection pressure on the infected population (i.e. us) has eliminated all the people who suffered the worst effects of infection by those vectors. Back in Tudor times, "the sweat" spread through England in waves, often killing in a day. Nowadays, we’re not even sure what kind of disease "the sweat" was! Presumably it killed off everyone that was vulnerable to it & either the remainder then provided sufficient herd immunity to eliminate the disease altogether, or it remains as one of the infectious, but relatively harmless infections that we all get in our lifetimes.

Very cogent and clear, thankyou.

It seems to me there is a *teleological* pressure on the virus not to become completely lethal, and kill 100% of its hosts, as it will then immediately die out itself. However I am also aware the virus is not sentient (PROBABLY: looking at you, China) and it does not gaze ahead to see its prospects, only to think "Oops, I'm so good I've killed everyone, including me"

Viruses are the strangest things. The more I think about them, the odder they get. Are they even alive? They exist on the edge of rationality.

Yes, they are weird things! They’re evolution in it’s rawest form, perfectly capable both of wiping out host & virus simultaneously or, alternatively, co-existing for millennia.

Fascinating and yet do no good in the world whatsoever unless I'm missing something. Quite like to see the back of.

No good for us here and now absolutely, unless of course "disease" of what ever cause taken on a longer time-scale, is a thoroughly natural population modifier and indeed motivator behind evolutional change. Indeed our short human history is littered with examples of disease leading to political and societal changes - if viruses weren't a thing would we be here now as we are?

Big_G_NorthWales said:

The issues with the shellfish, j d sports, the Irish Sea border , and other trading problems with the EU in normal times would be very difficult for Boris and HMG, but in truth virtually nobody is listening as covid has taken over our lives

Of course, as well as covid UVDL ill-judged and frankly inexplicable error over A16 and trying to curtail vaccine exports has very obviously lost the moral high ground and was completely avoidable. I doubt Junckers would have fallen into the same trap and neither would Barnier

It is becoming apparent that Boris is getting credit for the vaccination success as those vaccinated feel relief that they are receiving vital protection

In truth, I expect covid and the financial implications to dominate political discourse and the longer it does then difficulties with the EU will largely fade as dissues are addressed and different markets open up

In many ways Boris is very fortunate to be still in office, but I would not bet on him being replaced anytime soon, and even leading his party into GE2024. I would not have said that last November-December

We are living through change the like of which none of us have experienced in our adult life.

I say that of course as someone who was born in WW2 with v bombs over our house in Greater Manchester

The difference of course being the UK Government of the day had no control over the Luftwaffe. We however had, quite a considerable say and a veto on EU trade arrangements whilst we were inside the EU. Having decided to leave, we could have done so on a the back of a trade arrangement that was less unfavorable to UK fishing fleets.