To think that immuno-suppressing people with Covid is a bad idea?

[andthusly]

I've seen several sources reporting that the B117 variant originated in a single immuno-suppressed individual who was being treated for cancer. Just read a long article about it here. www.wired.co.uk/article/chronic-infection-uk-coronavirus-variant

What can be done about this? Can patients who are on these therapies have them stopped if they contract Covid? Can they be isolated more effectively? It's a harsh line of thinking but it seems that keeping this man alive had led to thousands of other deaths, as well as fucking up the lives of millions of people, perhaps with lifelong consequences.

It's one thing if viruses mutate naturally. Not a lot we can do, and they usually become more infectious and less contagious. But it's frightening if high tech medicine for a tiny number of very sick people is going to keep this pandemic going almost indefinitely. The 'old' Covid would not have brought us to this situation.

Some people have a suppressed immune system for a number of reasons, not just due to treatments.

This is also just an assumption. Its not a fact, only a possibility that will be looked into more. Even if it did become factual, I'd take a guess that stopping treatments would be based on risk factors for the patient.

To quote the article you link to:

But the real problem isn’t chronic infection – it’s a situation where the pandemic is so out of control that the virus has endless opportunities to mutate into new variants.

Stopping the emergence of new variants means doing more of what we know stops transmission: wearing face masks, social distancing, working from home and tracing infections.

What can be done about this? Can patients who are on these therapies have them stopped if they contract Covid? Can they be isolated more effectively?

...well a lot of people on immunosuppression are having to shield yet again, so are isolating pretty effectively already. Or do you suggest we put them in quarantine camps because of a theory you read on the internet?

But it's frightening if high tech medicine for a tiny number of very sick people is going to keep this pandemic going almost indefinitely.

There's probably a lot more people on immunosuppression than you'd think, and they're not all "very sick"; they live pretty normal lives.

What a fucking ignorant thread.

I think you’re misunderstanding, those 17 reported mutations could also have happened in 17 people progressively. Not to mention all the people who are immunosuppressed not due to medication. It’s a slightly increased risk, nothing more

@andthusly

You know you can be immunosuppressed without medication. The variant would have come anyway, that’s how viruses work, they mutate.
HTH.

This seems very ignorant really OP, and offensive. As above there are a number of reasons a person may be living with a weakened immune system. Many of them may not even yet know it.
Immunosuppression treatment is vital for patients survival and quality of life or to save a life. Covid is not the be all and end all when it comes to cause of death or cause of ill health in this country or indeed any other.

The chronically ill have been isolating or to frightened to go out for the best part of a year whilst the healthy were encouraged to go out when allowed, which they did in their droves and we are where we are.

Glib and selective oppression of the disabled and clinically vulnerable is a woefully pitiful and bigoted answer to a virus that will continue to mutate so long as it has motility.

Article written by Matt Reynolds, who has a first class degree in English Literature and English Language. Not sure whether this qualifies him to comment on the complexity of gene mutation in viruses.