[HN Gopher] Data seems to indicate omicron milder, more transmis...
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Data seems to indicate omicron milder, more transmissible,
hospitalizations low
Author : kvee
Score : 48 points
Date : 2021-12-09 18:58 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (twitter.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (twitter.com)
| pc86 wrote:
| How does one jump from "Omicron is more transmissible and less
| deadly than Delta" to "Immunity...is kicking in!" That seems like
| quite a leap compared to a seemingly much more likely reason,
| that this is a mutation and it just happens to be less deadly
| (probably because of whatever change makes it more transmissible
| but still basically random chance/evolutionary pressure). I don't
| see how previous infections and/or vaccinations have anything to
| do with the characteristics of Omicron.
| wccrawford wrote:
| >Immunity through vaccination and previous infection is kicking
| in!
|
| Because this version is more transmissible, and
| (theoretically?) causes your body to create antibodies that are
| effective against the other variants, this version of the virus
| will cause more people than ever to have antibodies without as
| much risk of death or long-term illness. People will either get
| the vaccine, or their risk of contracting covid will go up.
|
| They didn't mean "has kicked in", they mean it's starting to.
| newbamboo wrote:
| I gave them more credit than that. Maybe I misinterpreted
| their tweet to favorably.
| [deleted]
| singlow wrote:
| If mutation increases chance of vaccinated person getting a
| detectable infection, the hospitalization stats may show lower
| rates even though it is no less severe for the unvaccinated
| population.
| newbamboo wrote:
| This was my interpretation. Disclaimer: I have been an err on
| the side of caution person since Jan 2020.
| Majromax wrote:
| > (probably because of whatever change makes it more
| transmissible but still basically random chance/evolutionary
| pressure)
|
| That's the trick. Delta already appears to be very, very
| transmissible. If Omicron's growth is due entirely to improved
| transmissibility, then it would have to spread in a non-
| distanced, vulnerable population at an implausibly high rate,
| comparable to some of the most transmissible viruses ever
| studied.
|
| However, if Omicron's improved spread is partially through
| immune escape, then its growth could be explained through
| reinfections and breakthrough infections -- people who are
| largely immune to Delta are contracting a mild case of Omicron.
| That does not make the variant inherently less deadly, since
| it's not an apples-to-apples comparison on the ill populations.
|
| It will probably be some time yet before we have reliable
| statistics on the severity of Omicron in the never-infected,
| never-vaccinated cohort. In the meantime, there's reasonable
| cause to be concerned for vulnerable people (elderly, people
| with lung conditions, or the immunocompromised) who are
| partially relying on low community infection rates for their
| personal protection.
| modulusshift wrote:
| So is this the fabled transition into COVID becoming the common
| cold? More infectious, less deadly?
| fennecfoxen wrote:
| It turns out deadliness is a liability in the long term
| evolutionary success of most viruses!
| KarlKemp wrote:
| As it turns out that's a myth. AIDS, rabies, measles, Ebola,
| Marburg, Hep A/B/C: none of these viruses have gotten milder,
| in 60+ years of evolution. There are Egyptian mummies showing
| signs of smallpox, a disease that killed 350,000,000 people
| in the 20th century, more than two millennia later.
|
| It's also quite obvious, mechanistically: COVID doesn't lose
| many infections by eventually killing the patient who, by
| then, is obviously sick and most often in the hospital. It
| gets 80%+ of retransmission even before symptoms appear,
| removing all evolutionary pressure from the later stages.
| nchi3 wrote:
| None of them are the same family as other viruses which
| cause the common cold.
|
| I doubt the top epidemiologists are spreading myths.
|
| The "unusual" cases where covid is causing death might not
| be enough, no. The fact that it causes people to stay at
| home however could be.
| KarlKemp wrote:
| So... the new goalpost is, "top epidemiologist say that
| there is a pattern of common-cold-viruses to get milder
| with time"?
|
| Do any of them have names? (Either the viruses or the
| epidemiologists)
|
| And that's supposedly because... these common cold
| viruses were just too quick to kill their victims, at
| first?
| tharne wrote:
| > It's also quite obvious, mechanistically: COVID doesn't
| lose many infections by eventually killing the patient who,
| by then, is obviously sick and most often in the hospital.
|
| But viruses spread in the real world not some hypothetical
| lab. In the real world as viruses become deadlier they tend
| to provoke a much larger response from governments and
| populations, both in terms of prevention and
| vaccines/cures/treatments. That's why there's a lot more
| money spent on potential HIV vaccines than on vaccines for
| the common cold. Being deadlier is a distinct disadvantage
| if you're a virus trying to survive for the long haul.
| KarlKemp wrote:
| So how does Omicron have any advantage, right now, from
| that supposed difference? Wouldn't every mild strain just
| suffer from governments' efforts targeting the bad
| strains, which ruin it for all the others? Note that any
| future benefits cannot explain evolutionary changes in
| the present because viruses don't strategize.
| dTal wrote:
| Long-term disability of the host, however, affects them not
| at all.
| Closi wrote:
| Depends if healthy hosts are better at spreading, however
| all this depends on the selection pressures in the short
| term.
|
| A virus probably doesn't 'care' that much about a 1% host
| death rate in the short term.
| marginalia_nu wrote:
| Someone should let smallpox and anthrax in on this
| knowledge.
| marginalia_nu wrote:
| Someone should let smallpox and anthrax in on this knowledge.
| fennecfoxen wrote:
| What smallpox? It's been _eradicated_.
| mint2 wrote:
| The reason it's eradicated is entirely due to
| vaccinations and the unique fact it had no animal
| reservoirs.
|
| Prior to that, it was both very deadly and very
| contagious. Those facts were not hurting it.
|
| Those attributes did not make it evolutionarily weak
| unless you count motivating people to make vaccines.
|
| What is your point?
| cercatrova wrote:
| I don't think they're disagreeing with you, just saying
| that one cannot "ask smallpox" because it's already
| eradicated.
| marginalia_nu wrote:
| Smallpox still exists as lab samples. It's in virus
| prison. It's not dead.
| RandomBK wrote:
| It depends on whether you consider vaccines and human
| intervention as part of the 'natural' feedback process
| that tends to make viruses less severe.
|
| In other words, the high-level theory is that more severe
| viruses either kill their hosts, or make them so sick
| that they stop interacting with other potential hosts. A
| form of social distancing, if you will.
|
| In both cases, the virus is triggering some form of
| behavior change in its host that reduces its
| reproduction, providing evolutionary pressure towards
| milder viruses.
|
| One could argue that the development and wide
| distribution of a vaccine is just one form of host
| behavior change, and should be factored in.
| asadkn wrote:
| That seems like a rather premature conclusion. WHO mentioned:
|
| > Data which looked at hospitalizations across South Africa
| between 14 November and 4 December found that ICU occupancy was
| only 6.3 % - which is very low compared with the same period when
| the country was facing the peak linked to the Delta variant in
| July.
|
| Did they account for previous infection or vaccination status?
| What if a lot of these are breakthroughs/reinfections.
| Considering excess deaths in South Africa, their national data on
| number of cases is sort of, doubtful [1].
|
| Further, they seem to have observed mainly a population under 40.
|
| [1]: https://theconversation.com/unpacking-south-africas-
| excess-d...
| tynpeddler wrote:
| > That seems like a rather premature conclusion
|
| The "Seems to indicate" verbiage means that these are early
| findings, expected to stay the same, but may change over time.
| newbamboo wrote:
| Key words in the tweet: "Immunity through ... previous infection
| is kicking in!"
|
| And the elderly and morbidly obese have already been removed from
| the sample.
|
| What's the vaccination rate in SA again?
| bewaretheirs wrote:
| Vaccination rate in SA is high for Africa but still low - was
| 35% in late November. Unlike much of the rest of Africa they're
| not limited by vaccine supply and have asked vaccine makers to
| slow shipments as they have enough in stock at the moment:
|
| See: https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/exclusive-south-
| africa-...
| [deleted]
| sjg007 wrote:
| So a random twitter thread from some random twitter user? How
| about post tweets from epidemiologists who study the thing.
|
| Right now there is a big dichotomy. The majority of the
| epidemiologists and scientists say things are going to be bad.
| Then we have mainstream media going off of clinical notes. Still
| those notes don't square with increased hospitalizations of the
| very young.
|
| We are probably right in the middle of Simpson's paradox and only
| time will tell.
| Kye wrote:
| She helped develop the vaccine.
| viraptor wrote:
| This random user is (from bio) "Senior Scientist / Vaccine
| Research & Development".
| danaris wrote:
| Having a bit of cognitive dissonance to find out that
| experienced vaccine researchers are furries?
|
| The poster's bio on the right clearly states that they're a
| senior vaccine R&D scientist, and they've been posting well-
| sourced and cogent analysis of the pandemic since it started.
| This isn't just some rando on Twitter.
| akomtu wrote:
| My go-to response to fearmongering around omicron is asking for
| mortality stats compared to Delta.
| nomel wrote:
| That would require being aware of "immunity" in the
| population being compared, with order of least to most being
| something like: unvaccinated without previous infection,
| previous infection, vaccinated, and vaccinated with
| breakthrough infection/previous infection with vaccine.
|
| If you just looked at something raw like
| hospitalization/infected, like I see being used, you don't
| get a meaningful comparison, since much of the population now
| has some form of immunity compared to delta.
|
| The most interesting would be comparing
| hospitalization/infected for unvaccinated at some older age,
| like > 50yo.
| sjg007 wrote:
| It's literally too early to answer that question. The proxies
| at this point are basically linearly related -> case counts,
| hospitalizations, ICU, death.
|
| It took months to answer that for Delta vs the reference...
| And everyone said Delta was less lethal than the original
| strain and surprise it is not.
| Arete314159 wrote:
| Other scientists have pointed out that hospitalizations and
| deaths are a lagging indicator. Nobody can say it's milder yet.
| Try again in 6 weeks.
| bewaretheirs wrote:
| Title should say "omicron", not "omnicron".
| dang wrote:
| Fixed now. Thanks!
| bewaretheirs wrote:
| Thank you!
| cbfrench wrote:
| (Omnicron would make a great name for a time-travel company,
| however.)
| [deleted]
| tomp wrote:
| Some people will excuse government over-reaction by saying "they
| were _right_ to react strongly because this variant _could have_
| been more lethal ".
|
| We'll see if the governments will ease these restrictions now
| that it's becoming more and more clear that there's no reason to
| panic.
| happytoexplain wrote:
| >"they were right to react strongly because this variant could
| have been more lethal"
|
| It sounds like you're disagreeing with this logic (from the
| phrase "excuse government over-reach"), but you haven't
| elucidated.
| tomp wrote:
| I don't disagree entirely. I mainly think it's stupid. Flight
| bans haven't worked in March 2020, nor December 2021 ("UK
| variant"), and there's no reason to believe they would work
| now. The only thing that seems to work (to some degree) is
| AUS/NZ/SG-style total flight ban.
|
| But then the purpose of politics is showmanship, not
| effective action.
| nyokodo wrote:
| > AUS/NZ/SG-style total flight ban.
|
| Thankfully they weren't total flight bans, but flights are
| the only way in, and they required quarantine. This worked
| until Delta.
| tomp wrote:
| "Total" in the sense of "from everywhere" and "for
| everyone", not just "from South Africa" or "for
| unvaccinated"
| Majromax wrote:
| This would be consistent with Omicron having certain immune-
| escape features. People who previously had strong, neutralizing
| immunity (from vaccination or prior infection) may experience
| reinfection/breakthrough infection, but because of T-cell
| immunity or residual antibody immunity the variant is less likely
| to cause severe disease _than it would in a non-immune person_.
|
| If the above hypothesis is true, that doesn't necessarily make
| Omicron "milder" than Delta. Omicron would be infecting people
| who would not be infected by Delta, so in those people (some
| disease) is more severe than (no disease). I have not yet seen
| evidence one way or the other regarding severity for a first
| infection in a non-immune person.
|
| That is to say, "Omicron is milder!" could be an artifact of
| Simpson's Paradox.
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(page generated 2021-12-09 23:02 UTC)