Covid-19 #16: Not Waving, Loop-de-Looping

[rotting sea cow]

9 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

You’re not disputing my point. I said “unless you keep your borders closed until a vaccine is available, the area under the curve will be the same”. Clearly you are advocating for exactly that - namely a constrained economy for as long as it takes for a vaccine to be available.

You are forgetting the effect of having a late wave instead of an earlier one. You know much more about the disease now, how to prevent, how to treat it and what it's driving the epidemic.

As @The Anti-Targ said, neglecting the health of the people to save the economy will not save any of both as it has become more or less clear by now. Trying the prevent the health crisis, may still save the economy in the long run.

 

[rotting sea cow]

This is good

Study Adds to Evidence That Odor-Sensing Cells in the Nose Are the Key Entry Point for SARS CoV-2

[Zorral]

Which would be why the loss of smell was a symptom of the Great Influenza.

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Further, being able to smell someone's cigarette, breathing in second hand smoke, is really dangerous.  As I thought!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/08/21/can-you-get-coronavirus-cigarette-smoke/?

Quote

 

[....]
There is little evidence to suggest the smoke itself could be carrying the coronavirus, but researchers and physicians say that merely being able to smell someone’s cigarette is a warning sign you’re breathing air that was just in someone else’s lungs.
[....]
get a whiff of someone’s smoke — the respiratory particles that come along with it.

“If you smell somebody else’s exhaled cigarette smoke, then you are inhaling air that was in that person’s lungs,” Ristenpart said. “This means you could also be inhaling their virus-laden respiratory particles, which are composed of respiratory mucosa rather than ash.”

 

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The thing is, if children, speaking of cohorts below puberty, don't effectively spread and infect and acquire covid-19, why are all the preschools, etc. that opened in physical shared space, closing down again due to infection and contagion?

For instance --

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/21/coronavirus-iurope-dozens-schools-report-infections-berlin-germany-spain

 

[Clueless Northman]

Well, stuff about how kids, even teens, aren't really concerned was obviously bullshit put ahead because closing schools messes way too much with the workforce ability to work. But that was fake argument on the same level as "Masks aren't useful or effective, only medics should use them".

[The Anti-Targ]

11 hours ago, rotting sea cow said:

Couldn't have we said the same about masks, travelling, asymptomatic spread? It would have saved us a lot of trouble. Be as it may. We assumed that kids would have been spreaders of the disease and thus we closed the schools back in March and remained closed for many months. In the meanwhile better data has come regarding the role of children in the pandemic and they seem to be encouraging. Of course, I fully agree you cannot open the schools amid a large outbreak, but if countries get their things together it can become manageable.

The article I was quoting and it's around the media right now, says nothing about it. It assumes that viral loads correlates with infecting capacity. Furthermore, the data is poor for children (<12 yo) and they place young adults (22 yo) together with infants. You cannot make policy based on that study, but some will do.

 

 

 

Encouraging how? I was just watching a Dr John Campbell video posted today where he mentions some recent studies concluding that children are spreaders of the infection with viral loads in respiratory secretions being high. Low rates ad severity of illness but similar infectivity to adults, seems like the conclusion in the studies he was looking at.

[Fragile Bird]

Months ago I said there had to be a milder version of Covid-19, because it seemed strange that some areas were hit with terrible death rates while other areas were not. We had a discussion about the variations that had been identified back then (in March? April?) which had been labelled A, B and C, iirc. 

Well, it seems there is a milder version which is missing part of the DNA the deadlier version has. I assume more stories will pop up about this.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/milder-coronavirus-1.5694855

[The Anti-Targ]

10 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

Months ago I said there had to be a milder version of Covid-19, because it seemed strange that some areas were hit with terrible death rates while other areas were not. We had a discussion about the variations that had been identified back then (in March? April?) which had been labelled A, B and C, iirc. 

Well, it seems there is a milder version which is missing part of the DNA the deadlier version has. I assume more stories will pop up about this.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/milder-coronavirus-1.5694855

All strains of the virus are missing that DNA, because SARS-COV-2 is a RNA virus.

[rotting sea cow]

11 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

Encouraging how?

Mann, you made me work. Unforgivable!

Some links that might help

No evidence of secondary transmission of COVID-19 from children attending school in Ireland, 2020

Novel Coronavirus 2019 Transmission Risk in Educational Settings

COVID-19 in Children and the Dynamics of Infection in Families

COVID-19 Transmission and Children: The Child Is Not to Blame

Children and COVID-19

Covid-19 in schoolchildren – A comparison between Finland and Sweden

Bottom line: Children do not seem to be drivers of the epidemic neither are the most affected population. Of course, it will depend A LOT on the individual measures taken at the different settings. As a counter example, you have that Summer Camp in Georgia with an awful high second attack rate.

 

Quote

I was just watching a Dr John Campbell video posted today where he mentions some recent studies concluding that children are spreaders of the infection with viral loads in respiratory secretions being high. Low rates ad severity of illness but similar infectivity to adults, seems like the conclusion in the studies he was looking at.

I think the link between viral loads and infectiousness hasn't been proved. In a pandemic driven mainly by superspreaders this is even less clear. How you spread the virus may matter much more, large vs smaller droplets/aerosols. In that sense, children seem to exhale fewer large droplets in comparison to adults.

Low Exhaled Breath Droplet Formation May Explain Why Children are Poor SARS-CoV-2 Transmitters

[rotting sea cow]

10 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

Months ago I said there had to be a milder version of Covid-19, because it seemed strange that some areas were hit with terrible death rates while other areas were not. We had a discussion about the variations that had been identified back then (in March? April?) which had been labelled A, B and C, iirc. 

Well, it seems there is a milder version which is missing part of the DNA the deadlier version has. I assume more stories will pop up about this.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/milder-coronavirus-1.5694855

This is interesting. These deletions have been detected before, but this is the first time I've seen them being linked to disease severity. This is hard to test.

I wonder how prevalent are those mutations (e.g. whether they are co-circulating) and whether we are seeing only a part of the pandemic. They tell me that most of the RNA samples come from hospitals where of course you have people with the most severe symptoms, whereas hardly any come from asymptomatic people.

[Zorral]

Quote

An analysis of the geographical footprint of the rally’s attendees by a company using anonymized cellphone location data showed that the event drew participants from across the country, prompting fears that infections could spread further. The map of migration patterns associated with the rally showed participants traveling to Sturgis from locations across the continental United States, and back.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/22/world/covid-19-coronavirus.html?

 

Quote

We promised more from #Sturgis, so let's dive deeper! By visualizing devices across a rolling 3-hour window, we can actually see near real-time migration to and from the event. Huge opportunities for progress when this type of analysis is possible at scale! Data by @xmodesocial

Tracing via tech the Sturgis c-19 travel to-and-from travel trajectories.

 

 

Earlier I'd looked at North Dakota, where case load has risen over the last few days-- and you betcha there were to-and-from Sturgis. But one cannot discount the case rise in counties home to colleges and universities, such as those of Fargo-Moorhead, Grand Forks, and even Wahpeton and its State School of Science, which is now part of the NDSU system.

[DireWolfSpirit]

So if an atomic blast were right before your eyes on the horizon, would you really listen to the guy that says "Don't cover your eyes"?

I mean there's a certain level of basic intuit that should be built into anyone that has any survival instincts. 

The reason I've been thinking of this has been because of the droaning b.s. from people still whining about "B-b-bbut they told us masks weren't safe".

If one cannot make ones mind up whether to shove there hand into a open fire or look into the sun without protection or to go around inhaling contaminants without a breathing filter, without a "expert" telling you it's not a good idea, you are already a Darwin Award winner and shouldn't bother sweating any of this pandemic stuff anyways.

[Clueless Northman]

Exactly.

The only thing the "Masks aren't safe" BS has shown is who is unworthy of being a national leader (whichever the country) - or rather, who should sit in the dock and be prosecuted for enabling mass-murder, if I had it my way.

[The Anti-Targ]

Auckland Staying at level 3 lockdown until Sunday. I thought that would be the case as the current cluster is not fully contained and they need the extra 4 days to really lock it down to then open up the rest of Auckland, and I agree with the decision. The rest of the country stays at level 2 until Auckland drops to level 1.

[Werthead]

Hong Kong University confirmed the first recorded case (additional press release) of COVID reinfection today. There's been previous indications this may have happened but in each case it was close enough to the initial infection that a resurgence of symptoms in the same infection event could not be ruled out (i.e. it looked like two separate infections but in fact was two symptom outbreaks in the same, single infection). In this case there were 142 days between the initial infection and the second, which makes it impossible to be the same infection event (the previous record for virus being found in a patient was over the course of 37 days, I believe, so this is far longer).

Good news is that the second infection was asymptomatic, and the patient much more rapidly deployed antibodies to engage the virus. However, this initial study seemingly eliminates "herd immunity" as any kind of viable strategy. It also may hint that any vaccine will be time-limited in its effectiveness, and would have to be a regular, seasonal shot, not a one-and-done kind of deal.

[Maithanet]

3 hours ago, Werthead said:

Good news is that the second infection was asymptomatic, and the patient much more rapidly deployed antibodies to engage the virus. However, this initial study seemingly eliminates "herd immunity" as any kind of viable strategy. It also may hint that any vaccine will be time-limited in its effectiveness, and would have to be a regular, seasonal shot, not a one-and-done kind of deal.

It could mean that, but we can't conclude that just yet.  This tells us that reinfection is possible, but we don't yet know how common it is.  Reinfection could still be very rare for months or years after initial infection, in which case vaccine effectiveness could still be quite high. 

[Zorral]

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2020/08/long-haulers-covid-19-recognition-support-groups-symptoms/615382/

Limited views for Atlantic Monthly, but this is a covid-19 story so it is accessible to everyone.

Quote

 

Lauren nichols has been sick with COVID-19 since March 10, shortly before Tom Hanks announced his diagnosis and the NBA temporarily canceled its season. She has lived through one month of hand tremors, three of fever, and four of night sweats. When we spoke on day 150, she was on her fifth month of gastrointestinal problems and severe morning nausea. She still has extreme fatigue, bulging veins, excessive bruising, an erratic heartbeat, short-term memory loss, gynecological problems, sensitivity to light and sounds, and brain fog. Even writing an email can be hard, she told me, “because the words I think I’m writing are not the words coming out.” She wakes up gasping for air twice a month. It still hurts to inhale.
[....]
Of the long-haulers Putrino has surveyed, most are women. Their average age is 44. Most were formerly fit and healthy. They look very different from the typical portrait of a COVID-19 patient—an elderly person with preexisting health problems. “It’s scary because in the states that are surging, we have all these young people going out thinking they’re invincible, and this could easily knock them out for months,” Putrino told me. And for some, months of illness could turn into years of disability.

Our understanding of COVID-19 has accreted around the idea that it kills a few and is “mild” for the rest. That caricature was sketched before the new coronavirus even had a name; instead of shifting in the light of fresh data, it calcified. It affected the questions scientists sought to ask, the stories journalists sought to tell, and the patients doctors sought to treat. It excluded long-haulers from help and answers. Nichols’s initial symptoms were so unlike the official description of COVID-19 that her first doctor told her she had acid reflux and refused to get her tested. “Even if you did have COVID-19, you’re 32, you’re healthy, and you’re not going to die,” she remembers him saying. (She has since tested positive.)
[....]

 

 

[Mudguard]

4 hours ago, Werthead said:

Hong Kong University confirmed the first recorded case (additional press release) of COVID reinfection today. There's been previous indications this may have happened but in each case it was close enough to the initial infection that a resurgence of symptoms in the same infection event could not be ruled out (i.e. it looked like two separate infections but in fact was two symptom outbreaks in the same, single infection). In this case there were 142 days between the initial infection and the second, which makes it impossible to be the same infection event (the previous record for virus being found in a patient was over the course of 37 days, I believe, so this is far longer).

Good news is that the second infection was asymptomatic, and the patient much more rapidly deployed antibodies to engage the virus. However, this initial study seemingly eliminates "herd immunity" as any kind of viable strategy. It also may hint that any vaccine will be time-limited in its effectiveness, and would have to be a regular, seasonal shot, not a one-and-done kind of deal.

Can't rule out achieving herd immunity with just a single case.  It will depend on how widespread this is.  If it's very rare, it won't have much effect on reaching herd immunity.  If it's common, yeah, then we might be in trouble, depending on whether the second infection is almost always mild or not.

[rotting sea cow]

18 hours ago, Mudguard said:

Can't rule out achieving herd immunity with just a single case.  It will depend on how widespread this is.  If it's very rare, it won't have much effect on reaching herd immunity.  If it's common, yeah, then we might be in trouble, depending on whether the second infection is almost always mild or not.

Well. People doing contact tracing, etc. have been suspicious of re-infection cases for a while now. I suspect it's more common than we think. It's not exceptional. Now, Can these people infect others? Do they always develop mild cases? We don't know yet, but we need to keep an eye on that.

[rotting sea cow]

For @The Anti-Targ mostly. But useful for all, I guess. This study (pre-print actually) comment on the possibility of infection due to contaminated food.

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.08.17.255166v1

The assessment is that the risk is very low, but no in-existent.  They do what I was asking to see, they examine the viability of the virus and it seems it remains viable for at least 21 days in different types of meat. Important quote

Quote

Contamination of food is possible, and virus survival during transport and storage is likely. Food transportation and storage occurs in a controlled setting akin to a laboratory. Temperature and relative humidity is consistent and maintained and adverse conditions such as drying out is not permitted for the integrity of the food. In quantifying the viral titre we can reasonably assess a rate of decline in infectivity, which did not occur in any of the conditions we assessed.

We believe it is possible that contaminated imported food can transfer virus to workers as well as the environment. An infected food handler has the potential to become an index case of a new outbreak. The international food market is massive and even a very unlikely event could be expected to occur from time to time.

We'll see if this will survive peer review of course

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

Oh hey, look, universities across the country are reporting outbreaks. 500 kids at the University of Alabama tested positive after just the first week of classes.

Good luck having fall athletics if it’s going to spread like that.