SARS CoV-2 coronavirus / Covid-19 (No tin foil hat silliness please)

Brwned said:
We don't know enough about the specifics of this mutation but the general principle is that mutations are to be expected and aren't cause for concern on their own. There have been lots of documented variants that don't impact on the vaccine production process. If it significantly alters the spike protein then theoretically it can have a big effect on vaccine efficacy, but there's nothing suggesting that now. We've been assessing mutations since before it was declared a pandemic so we shouldn't panic about that.

General article about it here.
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This is a mutation on the spike protein, so we’ll see I guess. Fingers crossed.
 
MikeUpNorth said:
This is a mutation on the spike protein, so we’ll see I guess. Fingers crossed.
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Yeah, if you read the article you'll see this D614G strain was a mutation on the spike protein that the scientists that detected it were initially "alarmed" about, but through further studies they went on to find that it had no effect in terms of vaccine or treatment developments, or may even have made it easier for us to treat in some small ways. It comes down to the significance of the alteration and the type of alteration, which we shouldn't expect to know much about for a good while yet. It took them months to do lab experiments to verify most of the original claims.

One of the things in our favour is that significant alterations to the spike protein don't just alter the vaccine response, but they alter the virus pathogenecity - sometimes harming itself. That's what they think happened with SARS. The fact is we're targeting the thing that makes it bind to our cells. If the virus mutates so much that the binding process changes so dramatically, it might mutate its way into making things easier for us.

Viruses that encode their genome in RNA, such as SARS-CoV-2, HIV and influenza, tend to pick up mutations quickly as they are copied inside their hosts, because enzymes that copy RNA are prone to making errors. After the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) virus began circulating in humans, for instance, it developed a kind of mutation called a deletion that might have slowed its spread4.

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Despite the virus’s sluggish mutation rate, researchers have catalogued more than 12,000 mutations in SARS-CoV-2 genomes. But scientists can spot mutations faster than they can make sense of them. Many mutations will have no consequence for the virus’s ability to spread or cause disease, because they do not alter the shape of a protein, whereas those mutations that do change proteins are more likely to harm the virus than improve it (see ‘A catalogue of coronavirus mutations’). “It’s much easier to break something than it is to fix it,” says Hodcroft, who is part of Nextstrain, an effort to analyse SARS-CoV-2 genomes in real time.
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Santos J said:
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It sums up the govt's appalling communication regarding the pandemic all year. Leaks, rumours, u-turns, paywalls, inconsistencies and contradictions, double standards and no clarity whatsoever.
Feck this government and its pals in the media
 
FootballHQ said:
I get the feeling the new strain is much more serious than they're letting on, sudden mass rising of cases in London indicates this but obviously a few weeks until we know if the death figures will significantly shoot up. Hopefully won't happen given they're already grim but would be final middle finger up to 2020 from this virus.
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Agreed, I'm also hearing post boxes in the SE are full of Covid test's.

We just have to pray it doesn't escape the vaccine.
 
We have heard (from sources at work) Christmas is cancelled for tier 4, no mixing households
 
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F-Red said:
From what I can see, yes, however I wouldn’t be surprised that international travel guidance will chance in the coming days.
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Thanks had a trip to cancun booked out of Gatwick but I have no idea what’s going on. Zero clarity of rules on anything
 
The bloke on BBC looks like he's struggling to hold it together. I wouldn't be surprised if they pulled the plug on Christmas.
 
Liver_bird said:
Thanks had a trip to cancun booked out of Gatwick but I have no idea what’s going on. Zero clarity of rules on anything
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That’s the risk unfortunately, it’s a dynamic situation and the one thing that won’t be in abundance is notice, let alone clarity.

If you’re flying out of any airport in the South, I think you’ll likely see some cancellations if they’re going with a stay at home message.
 
Johnson being late to every single one of these fecking things does sum up how little he cares about or respects the people he governs.
 
Unfortunately the local lockdowns have only achieved in breeding resentment and resultant non compliance as a result. Time to bite the bullet and go back to what we had in March, UK wide.
 
Oh dear. New strain is causing carnage, 70% more transmissible.

Seems to me with last 10 months is whenever we get a little shred of good news it's immediately cancelled out by an even bigger f*** off from covid and looks like this will be the next two months of terrible news.
 
FootballHQ said:
Oh dear. New strain is causing carnage, 70% more transmissible.

Seems to me with last 10 months is whenever we get a little shred of good news it's immediately cancelled out by an even bigger f*** off from covid and looks like this will be the next two months of terrible news.
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Who'd have guessed letting a virus run rampant could have consequences?
 
Its the new strain.. It's not a case of things getting worse in winter or all the people moving about before Christmas.
 
FootballHQ said:
Oh dear. New strain is causing carnage, 70% more transmissible.

Seems to me with last 10 months is whenever we get a little shred of good news it's immediately cancelled out by an even bigger f*** off from covid and looks like this will be the next two months of terrible news.
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The f*** off is from our incompetent govenrment. Can't ease lockdown and have Christmas. They were too lax in their earlier announcement, trying to have their cake and eat out. It is one out the other, Germany are a prime example of good decision making.
 
Fluctuation0161 said:
The f*** off is from our incompetent govenrment. Can't ease lockdown and have Christmas. It is one out the other, Germany are a prime example of good decision making.
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I get all that but cases were rising here anyway because xmas became a thing so seems this new form has just accelerated things. Winter was always going to be a terrible period and here we are.
 
This is down to the new variant spreading rapidly in these areas, he says. It doesn’t seem to be more dangerous but does seem to spread more easily and could increase the R by 0.4 or more and up to 70% more transmissible than the original disease, he says.
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If this is the basis for the new mutation being 'more transmissible' could it not simply indicate that thanks to, say, governmental incompetence leading to general fatigue with the tier system and with government diktats that people just aren't socially distancing properly anymore?
 
FootballHQ said:
I get all that but cases were rising here anyway because xmas became a thing so seems this new form has just accelerated things. Winter was always going to be a terrible period and here we are.
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So why announce only a few weeks ago that Christmas is back on AND we will ease the lockdown from the 2nd December. It was all so predictable. There was no trade off. Terrible leadership in the UK.

For example, Germany has a 3 week national lockdown around Xmas day, allowing a small number of households to meet for Xmas day.
 
NinjaFletch said:
If this is the basis for the new mutation being 'more transmissible' could it not simply indicate that thanks to, say, governmental incompetence leading to general fatigue with the tier system and with government diktats that people just aren't socially distancing properly anymore?
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I may have missed it so apologies if I have but have they produced the scientific evidence for this new strain?
 
Absolutely embarrassing especially after the press conference the other day about Christmas. He's got to go, awful leadership, he'll never pull this back. It is the right call but it's too late.
 
acnumber9 said:
Unfortunately the local lockdowns have only achieved in breeding resentment and resultant non compliance as a result. Time to bite the bullet and go back to what we had in March, UK wide.
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Why should people in Cornwall lose the livelihood they have built for decades because of something that's a problem 500 miles away?
 
Is there any information when they may be able to detail if the vaccine efficacy is affected by this new strain?
 
Relevated said:
It doesn't impact flights at all. It will after the December 30th update I bet.
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Inbound? What was the situation like in November?

It's selfish, but my fiance is moving here in early January and really can't have that delayed
 
Acole9 said:
Absolutely embarrassing especially after the press conference the other day about Christmas. He's got to go, awful leadership, he'll never pull this back. It is the right call but it's too late.
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They know January is going to be carnage, but they haven't got the smarts, or balls, to go full lockdown like Germany. Boris sees himself as Santa.
 
Boris said this just a few days ago, so I wouldn't bet against further changes before Christmas

 
Fluctuation0161 said:
So why announce only a few weeks ago that Christmas is back on AND we will ease the lockdown from the 2nd December. It was all so predictable. There was no trade off. Terrible leadership in the UK.

For example, Germany has a 3 week national lockdown around Xmas day, allowing a small number of households to meet for Xmas day.
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Oh they messed up the November period for sure. And just insisting all Uni and schools went back as normal in September was a massive super spreader that also could've been halted with some tweaks.

Ultimately though there's no method that will result in 0 covid cases and 0 covid deaths anytime soon. Germany daily cases are miles higher than in March-April although of course they've done the best of all the major countries. Same for Italy. That's just a consequence of winter I'm afraid whatever the restrictions. More people just get ill compared to June-August when things cooled down despite lack of social distance on beaches and everywhere else.
 
Acole9 said:
Absolutely embarrassing especially after the press conference the other day about Christmas. He's got to go, awful leadership, he'll never pull this back. It is the right call but it's too late.
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At some point people have to get past lashing out at Boris and address the elephant in the room that many people in this country put their trust in him not once but twice.
 
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