I only use them when the person being described is definitely spreading antivaccine pseudoscience and conspiracy theories, and I believe I documented quite thoroughly that Vanden Bossche was doing exactly that in his letter. March 9, 2021. A new study has an explanation: The surface proteins that the measles virus uses to enter cells are ineffective if they suffer any mutation, meaning that any changes to the virus come at a major cost. Coronavirus mutations not (necessarily) cause for alarm. “Many of these areas can only be reached by plane. Bollinger explains: "All RNA viruses mutate over time, some more than others. But here we are. Even as people began to feel some hope—or at least cautious optimism—early this summer that the pandemic could recede to the background, there was still the threat that new mutations of the COVID-19 virus could bring it back, and it might be even stronger. Both viruses infect the respiratory tract, show similar symptoms, and use surface proteins to infect the host. Another point with covid-19 is the lack of independence between cases. Mutation rates coupled with the selective pressure exerted by the host's immune system has steered HCV diversification into 8 genotypes and 90 subtypes[104,105]. . What's different is it has 10 times greater mortality rates than the seasonal . Non-COVID-19 Vaccines in Patients with Chronic Liver Disease . These obstacles are affecting the efforts to bring the measles epidemic under control, says Lampaert. Early in the post, VandenBossche writes: Innate immunity critically contributes to protecting a population from Covid-19. Despite the virus's sluggish mutation rate, researchers have catalogued more than 12,000 mutations in SARS-CoV-2 genomes. This is, of course, largely speculation. Breakthrough infections typically cause mild to moderate symptoms. She was buried on the same day as her cousin, who died from the same disease. Vanden Bossche tries to impress with jargon and his handwaving invocation of variants coupled with invocations of natural killer cells and the innate immune system, and it does sound very impressive indeed. He seems to have been prescient, even if the causes are not exactly as he had predicted. The novel coronavirus seems to mutate once every two weeks, according to a team of researchers who . No one knows with total certainty, and we’re unlikely to ever find out. Intriguingly, we identified homologous domains in severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the COVID-19 causing virus, with rubella virus as well as the two paramyxoviruses. So disappointing. There can be no doubt that resistance to vaccinal Abs will be the endpoint of any mass vaccination program that uses modern vaccines during a pandemic of an acute self-limiting viral disease caused by a highly mutable virus. "We don't yet know how long the mRNA vaccines will protect or how much they will cost. “The same happened during the West African Ebola outbreak, when measles vaccination activities were disrupted, leading to a resurgence of the disease.”. This claim dates back long before the pandemic and has long been used to spread fear, uncertainty, and doubt about attenuated live virus vaccines like the MMR and varicella (chickenpox) vaccines, leading to false claims before the pandemic that MMR strain measles was the “real” cause of measles outbreaks. But the data, including unpublished studies cited by public-health officials, are pointing in the same direction: Breakthrough infections are happening. Until Covid-19 cases overall decrease, “the best way to prevent the emergence of more variants is getting fully vaccinated, not traveling internationally, and following strict infection prevention measures including wearing a face mask, physically distancing from others, and not attending large social gatherings.”. Our team in Beboto also worked closely with community leaders to raise awareness about measles prevention and how suspected measles patients could access free medical treatment in MSF supported health facilities. This led a reader (whose name I will not reveal) to ask me whether, in light of the much more transmissible (and possibly more virulent) Delta variant that’s been spreading across the US like proverbial wildfire over the last few of months, I might want to “reconsider” my previous criticism of Vanden Bossche: I just saw an MSN article about how doctors are terrified of what is coming…I wonder if perhaps you would reconsider your critique of Geert Vanden Bossche. This is to say that every further increase in vaccine coverage rates will further contribute to forcing the virus into resistance to neutralizing, S-specific Abs. Beth Mole - 4/15/2021, 2:46 PM. COVID-19 lineages and variants GISAID's EpiCoV database employs tools to assign phylogenetic clades and lineages to genetic sequences of the pandemic coronavirus. Comparatively, there are already 69 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 around the world according to the World Health Organization (WHO). UNC Immunology Expert Discusses COVID-19 Vaccines, Debunks Misinformation. Updated: November 3, 2021.] “They found that, that the influenza virus was getting about 25 mutations per 10,000 nucleotides,” Arwady said. Both these diseases are dangerous but preventable. They have ascribed this to S-directed immune pressure that is now rapidly building up in the population. A mutation (viral mutation or genetic mutation) of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) virus is a change in the genetic sequence of the SARS-CoV-2 virus when compared . This biophysical phenomenon already explains why morbidity and mortality rates tend to increase with increased infectious viral pressure (e.g., due to enhanced intrinsic infectiousness of the circulating virus or due to overcrowding, mass gatherings, close contacts etc., especially if combined with poor hygiene and housing conditions). Moreover, the more transmissible the virus, the higher the percentage of the population that needs to be immune, either through vaccination or previous infection, to reach herd immunity. The MSF Foundation aims to create a fertile arena for logistics and medical knowledge-sharing to meet the needs of MSF and the humanitarian sector as a whole. The operative word, of course, is “seems”, and I can certainly see how the emergence of variants like the Delta variant in a mere few months since Vanden Bossche’s viral letter might seem to support a conclusion that his prediction was correct. Children are still dying in my community.”. If we only had 28,616 cases of COVID-19, at the current death rate of 4.1%, that would . “In the area between Bria and Ouadda in the centre of the country, for instance, clashes prevented us from carrying out our planned medical and vaccination activities.”. This has been widely discussed in the media, as well as in the scientific literature, for instance, by Madrigal: But it’s also become clear that vaccinated people who do get infected can spread the virus. Let’s look at Vanden Bossche’s argument a bit further. The authors even say so! He also cites other articles, but one only discusses what “innate antibodies” are, while the other discusses how such antibodies might be the “bridge” between innate and adaptive immunity. For instance, the Delta variant was first identified in December 2020 in India. Notice how Vanden Bossche zeroed in like a laser on innate immunity, when there are several other plausible contributors to this difference in severity of COVID-19 in children compared to adults. The rMeV expressing a soluble stabilized, prefusion spike (preS) is much more potent in triggering SARS-CoV-2-specific . What is he claiming now? By reducing an infected person’s viral load, however, it decreases transmission, providing substantial indirect protection. But also populations that are subject to mass vaccination can exert strong immune pressure on viral infectiousness (i.e., on S protein). Coronaviruses are named for the crown-like spikes on their surface. COVID-19 Flu vs COVID-19 death rate in the US, by age 12% 10% 4% 2% .01% Flu in the US .83% COVID-19 in the US 10.4% . And when they do, those people can spread the virus. Why not somewhere else with similar vaccination rates and political opposition to viral countermeasures? The number of new cases has continued to rise in recent weeks in the state, with some officials fearing that a new surge could be taking place even as vaccinations continue to rise. Of course, one also must point out that the best “incubator” for evolutionary selection pressure to produce more transmissible variants that can evade the immune response is to have a virus circulating freely among billions of people and that there is nothing special about “natural” immunity compared to vaccine-acquired immunity to SARS-CoV-2 that would make it any less of an evolutionary selection pressure to select for more transmissible variants, the claims of advocates of “natural herd immunity” as a way out of the pandemic notwithstanding. Then, the Delta variant surfaced in the United States. Some mutations of the coronavirus have been shown to be more contagious or to cause more serious COVID-19 illness. This logistical centre in Amsterdam purchases, tests, and stores equipment including vehicles, communications material, power supplies, water-processing facilities and nutritional supplements. Pullen, who is also a member on the American . He’s just pointed to the emergence of more transmissible variants, which happened before the mass vaccination program, and blamed the vaccine for them. Recent reports, however, has raised great concerns over COVID-19 impact on vaccinations. Alphonsine Ekima, 43, and her family have felt the direct impact of this. Even so, Lee stressed that a widespread nonsterilizing vaccine could still reduce burden on the health care system and save lives. But, wait, you’re thinking: Didn’t the Delta variant spread in the US after the mass vaccination program was well under way? As noted by Alexis Madrigal, founder of the COVID Tracking Project: One way to think about it, as the epidemiologist Ellie Murray has laid out, is that if Delta is as transmissible as the CDC thinks, we need a much higher percentage of our population vaccinated for immunizations and natural infection alone to cause the virus to peter out. Vanden Bossche’s claim is the latest attempt to “flip the script” and, in response to the observation that it is the unvaccinated who can be a danger to the vaccinated by spreading disease given that no vaccine is 100% effective, has traditionally involved the claim that “shedding” of virus from the vaccine after vaccination can result in the infection of unvaccinated children who come into contact with the recently vaccinated. To upskill and provide training to locally-hired MSF staff in several countries, MSF has created the MSF Academy for Healthcare. As antivaxxers making this argument always do, unfortunately, he ignores the much larger problem in which free circulation of the virus is a far more powerful driver of evolution than the relatively small proportion of the world population that has as yet been vaccinated. “There needs to be extensive genomic surveillance studies that are done to assess how the vaccines’ efficacy is affected by the Lambda variant,” Kullar wrote. Study: A measles-vectored COVID-19 vaccine induces long-term immunity and protection from SARS-CoV-2 challenge in mice.Image Credit: LookerStudio / Shutterstock Vaccination is a selective pressure, but it’s just one of many, and the current crop of variants all evolved before there even was a mass vaccination program. As concerns grow about the spread of COVID-19 in Chad, parts of the country remain gripped by a two-year measles epidemic that is increasing in intensity and shows no signs of slowing down, leaving the country at risk of a twin crisis. The good news is that measles is easy to prevent with safe and effective vaccines. If the idea that the vaccinated have very mild illness is true, they are much more probable to spread the illness. The problem with ARR in covid-19 vaccines is that the follow-up had to be very short (just 2-3 months) in order to take decissions asap. Like H1N1 and seasonal flus, COVID-19 is highly communicable. The mutation rate in the SARS-CoV genome was estimated to be 0.80 - 2.38 x 10-3 nucleotide substitution per site per year which is in the same order of magnitude as other RNA viruses. Natural, innate antibodies (Abs) and Natural Killer (NK) cells can target non-mutable common structures in otherwise highly mutating viruses and hence, deal with all Sars-CoV-2 variants (1). “It is important to remember that while donor funding continues to be diverted towards COVID-19 activities, we must continue to do what we can to help fight measles and ensure other health services aren’t neglected to avoid a catastrophic situation where all these issues merge into one even bigger problem.”. MSF teams have been responding to the measles epidemic in all three countries – providing outbreak response vaccination, treating children for the disease, and for other illnesses such as malnutrition – amid logistics challenges and insecure contexts, all while the COVID-19 pandemic looms as a further potential threat and distraction for governments, donors and other health organisations. This Guide explains the terms, concepts, and rules of humanitarian law in accessible and reader-friendly alphabetical entries. As such, it does not protect against mild disease. For example, they may not recognize their mild symptoms as COVID, and not consider that they, being vaccinated, are able to contract and spread it. The new coronavirus has already mutated a handful of times, which has many people wondering whether the mutations could lead to a more severe, deadlier disease. In fairness, one does have to acknowledge the difference in situations.
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