Italian doctors saying Covid is getting less potent!?

[Chosennone]

Hopeful link works 🤞
I read this and there is very little detail. I was surprised that it said that the virus is virtually eradicated in Italy.

mobile.reuters.com/article/amp/idUSKBN2370OQ?__twitter_impression=true

@CoachBombay

I’m not disagreeing or citing Wikipedia as a source of truth - but if what it’s saying below is even vaguely true, it’s stunning - like the reverse of covid

Patterns of fatality

The pandemic mostly killed young adults. In 1918–1919, 99% of pandemic influenza deaths in the U.S. occurred in people under 65, and nearly half of deaths were in young adults 20 to 40 years old. In 1920, the mortality rate among people under 65 had decreased sixfold to half the mortality rate of people over 65, but 92% of deaths still occurred in people under 65.[96] This is unusual, since influenza is typically most deadly to weak individuals, such as infants under age two, adults over age 70, and the immunocompromised. In 1918, older adults may have had partial protection caused by exposure to the 1889–1890 flu pandemic, known as the "Russian flu".[97]

According to historian John M. Barry, the most vulnerable of all – "those most likely, of the most likely", to die – were pregnant women. He reported that in thirteen studies of hospitalized women in the pandemic, the death rate ranged from 23% to 71%.[98] Of the pregnant women who survived childbirth, over one-quarter (26%) lost the child.[99]

Another oddity was that the outbreak was widespread in the summer and autumn (in the Northern Hemisphere); influenza is usually worse in winter.[100]

Modern analysis has shown the virus to be particularly deadly because it triggers a cytokine storm (overreaction of the body's immune sys

Ard it's sort of answers its own question though 65+ may have had base line immunity from another similar flu by the sounds of it.

Also 3million people died of typhoid in eastern Europe post 1918! The first world war really did allow disease to spread far and wide due to global transmission from troops coming back home.

Some people say Spanish Flu was deadly to the young because they had all been worn down by war, I suppose trench warfare and poor sanitation in low income populations didn't help! I'm not too sure on that one as the only reason the young died, I think 65+ exposure to a similar influenza is probably more the answer.

Covid however has a very low fatality rate compared to other communicable diseases luckily.

Hello all, thanks for sharing this, it’s such a positive possible development, something I think we all need a bit of right now.

I wanted to share that Sky has now covered this story with a few more quotes from the doctors in italy, in case you’re interested:

news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-no-longer-clinically-exists-in-italy-top-doctor-says-11998608

@Dellow that’s fascinating about your friends hospital! Please keep us updated if you hear any more from them, if you don’t mind?

@lefluffypants I will do , I am keep a sharp eye on changes but I am wondering if this is because of social distancing and better weather/UV rays killing more virus before it travels to other people. I hope it is true though !

Isn’t Spanish Flu the same as Swine Flu? Think it’s incorporated into annual flu vaccines?
“I think we were lucky it was a coronavirus and not influenza, otherwise you would be seeing death rates like 1918” I agree - a nasty new flu could easily be worse , and attack the young and fit.
“Unlikely, seeing as influenza comes around every year and we already have vaccines against influenza.” No we can vaccinate against strains already in circulation, a brand new mutation? No, certainty not quickly enough to prevent a pandemic.

@TrustTheGeneGenie

Perhaps they're just sticking to the plan they've had all along? We were never going to be locked down until it was "safe"

It was only ever to protect the NHS. It did that.

Protecting the NHS is not a one-off thing - it's something we have to keep doing, we can't just tick it off as done. The NHS is only protected while infection rates in the UK are very low. If R goes above 1 then infections will go up and the NHS will be in danger again.

Infections are lower now but could quite easily go back up if people mistakenly think it's job done, no need to bother avoiding it any more. That's what worries me when people say "we were only doing it to protect the NHS and that's done now".

Make no mistake, if infections start to go up again exponentially, it will not only be the clinically 'vulnerable' or 'shielded' people who will suffer. We all will. All those NHS treatments that have a chance of getting back to normal now will stop again. Businesses and the economy will suffer horribly.

It's not over - until there's a vaccine, it's now a bit like running on a treadmill. If we all stop 'running' (i.e. working collectively on all the cleaning and testing and tracking and social distancing and self-isolating) to avoid catching the virus, or spreading it, we'll be right back at a potential disaster.

It would be wonderful if the virus does mutate to be weaker though, as that's the one thing that could change all that before there's a vaccine.

Just because you are 30, run 20miles a week and have a healthy diet, doesn't necessarily mean you are the strongest of the species. You have better odds of being one, but it's not a definite. Hence why a 54 year old can die of covid but a 75 year old survive.

Related to this - there have been several people aged over 100 reported as having survived Covid, but that's perhaps not surprising at all really, since to reach 100 in the first place you've probably got to have a pretty good body for fighting disease.

It's like athletes who are outliers in terms of lung size - within the whole population there are bound to be outliers who have really superlative immune systems or whose bodies are otherwise particularly resistant to common diseases, and they've got a better chance of getting to over 100 in the first place.

eeyore I never suggested it being over or advocating people acting like it is.

The NHS is well under capacity and considering it handled the first wave I'm sure it'll handle a slight increase.

it's sort of answers its own question though 65+ may have had base line immunity from another similar flu by the sounds of it.

The Spanish flu came in waves. The first wave in 1917 behaved a bit like a seasonal flu affecting the elderly and vulnerable. Then it died down over the summer months before mutating slightly and coming back and the second wave affecting the younger and fitter.

O potsed this on another thread but I am no expert.

I think predictions based on models have assumed zero immunity and 100% of the population is vulnerable to this. That's now looking very wrong.

They have found that sars-cov-2 specific t cells are cross-reactive which are present in about 40-60% of the population due to previous common cold infections, probably inside the last couple of years. The documents are mostly studies which are a little complicated but there are some articles which spell it out in a way which is easier to understand. A specific as yet unknown common cold virus which is a coronavirus (there's only 4 of them that are endemic) provides this immune response and it's very widespread. They don't know which of the colds does it but I'm sure there are many people working on this in labs around the world right now.

Could one of the 4 existing HCoVs (common cold coronaviruses) function as an effective vaccine? My suspicion is that it could and this is what explains the very large number of very mild and asymptomatic cases. So effectively we are almost up to herd immunity with this cross-reactive response - obviously, too early to call celebration but enough anecdotal and scientific evidence appearing to give a good push in that direction. I suspect by the end of the month given all the apparent 'lockdown's over' behaviour already exhibiting then we will be able to call this much better.

www.cell.com/cell/pdf/S0092-8674(20)30610-3.pdf

Herd immunity though is not the same as what is alleged here by the Italian doctors. Herd immunity is when a sufficient number of individuals in the population (somewhere between 60% and 80%) have either been vaccinated or survived the disease and are carrying sufficient antibodies to combat any future infection.

What is being described here is the alleged weakening of the virus and its infectivity. If true, several issues arise. 1. This weakening can change as the virus mutates. 2. The form that is weakening in Italy is clearly not the one that is still killing people in the USA and elsewhere in large numbers. Given the lack of international travel, it is not possible for the weaker version to predominate. 3. Now that we have experienced what a virus that comes from animals can do to us, even if this virus dies out for whatever reason, we should be preparing now for the next one.

So viral weakening and effective herd immunity that would be a double good win.

Posted on wrong thread !

The question for me is whether the reduction in potency is due to a biological change in the virus, or Italy’s success in suppressing it (making it appear that the virus is weaker when actually intrinsically it’s not).

For instance, back in March only the most unwell would have been tested after they’d incubated they virus for many days. These would likely have had a very high viral load. Now, after nearly 3
months of heavy suppression, positive tests will likely include various asymptomatic people with low viral loads and those presenting at an early stage before virus levels have had a chance to multiply to high levels.

Hopefully it’s the former, but we should presume it’s the latter until evidence shows otherwise.

This thread has made me so happy. I so so hope it is true!

This thread has made me happy too. I know I need to see more scientific evidence before I will ever feel truly relaxed but if there is an ounce of truth in any of these theories it would be really heartening.
I will live cautiously but with hope.

Now that we have experienced what a virus that comes from animals can do to us, even if this virus dies out for whatever reason, we should be preparing now for the next one

I know you said it was the wrong thread, but just to say, we are preparing for it, they are preparing a vaccine now that prevents infections jumping from animals or humans. I watched a news article on it. Or it was mentioned at the daily briefing, I can’t remember but they are working on this now.

Now, after nearly 3months of heavy suppression, positive tests will likely include various asymptomatic people with low viral loads and those presenting at an early stage before virus levels have had a chance to multiply to high levels

This is completely true, but viral load is about how much time you spend with someone with it. So it wouldn’t then be about supporession. If you’ve got it and are contagious, you’ve got it and are contagious. Someone who spends a lot of time with you would still have a high viral load. Unless it’s mutated,,,

The man from who, he say no.

Next bot like to spread fake news about the virus being nothing.

what is Next bot?

This is completely true, but viral load is about how much time you spend with someone with it. So it wouldn’t then be about supporession. If you’ve got it and are contagious, you’ve got it and are contagious. Someone who spends a lot of time with you would still have a high viral load. Unless it’s mutated,,,

My understanding is infected people can have different quantities of the virus within them. The swabs recently taken appear to have less virus than those earlier in the pandemic. That would appear to be consistent with swabs being largely only being taken from those highly symptomatic patients that were being tested, as one would have expected in a healthcare system under stress. It also might be a mutation (and it would be amazing if Covid has mutated into something a lot more benign).... But to deduce that the only feasible conclusion is a mutation is wrong, and potentially dangerous if it leads to people reverting back completely to normal assuming Covid has been defeated.

@Derbygerbil

This is completely true, but viral load is about how much time you spend with someone with it. So it wouldn’t then be about supporession. If you’ve got it and are contagious, you’ve got it and are contagious. Someone who spends a lot of time with you would still have a high viral load. Unless it’s mutated,,,

My understanding is infected people can have different quantities of the virus within them. The swabs recently taken appear to have less virus than those earlier in the pandemic. That would appear to be consistent with swabs being largely only being taken from those highly symptomatic patients that were being tested, as one would have expected in a healthcare system under stress. It also might be a mutation (and it would be amazing if Covid has mutated into something a lot more benign).... But to deduce that the only feasible conclusion is a mutation is wrong, and potentially dangerous if it leads to people reverting back completely to normal assuming Covid has been defeated.

I know when they managed to infect monkeys with human smallpox, even those with immunity, they did so by giving them a large viral load which over whelmed their immune systems.

Viral load is important, as it can reduce your bodies chances of mounting a defence.

With distancing and better PPE, it seems quite reasonable that we are lowering virus load, and thus giving our bodies a better chance of fighting back.

Of course this doesn't mean the virus is getting weaker, and is not a good reason to stop PPE and distancing, or we will be back to square one.

No two people are the same, no two immune responses are the same. The strongest survive.

It’s not a matter of strength or weakness. It relates to all kind of complex interactions. For example, people with sickle-cell anaemia are less likely to succumb to malaria, but in general terms, you wouldn’t say someone with sickle-cell anaemia is stronger or fitter than someone without it.

Sickle-cell anaemia is therefore more common in malarial regions due to evolutionary selection. ‘The fittest’ might in some cases, such as the later waves of Spanish flu, be those with a weaker immune system.

@Newjez

Good post. The working assumption clearly needs to be that it’s suppression via social distancing and PPE that’s leading to a significant reduction in viral quantities in swabs, as this is consistent with how we’d expect viruses to behave.

It’s worrying when some posters are convinced that the results must mean that the virus has mutated into something insignificant and that it’s no longer a threat. That’s asking for trouble and for Covid to bite back....

Having said that, I hope it has mutated into something less dangerous, that would be fantastic.... but until there is scientific consensus on this (and at the moment, the scientists in the article don’t even seem to believe this!) I’ll stick to thinking the less dramatic reason is much more likely.

Nonetheless, whether the weakening is due to suppression or mutation, it’s very good news.

Now that we have experienced what a virus that comes from animals can do to us, even if this virus dies out for whatever reason, we should be preparing now for the next one

Preparing for the next disease from animals has in theory been a priority for a long time - see this list and 'Disease X':

www.who.int/activities/prioritizing-diseases-for-research-and-development-in-emergency-contexts

In practice people (incl media) tend to punish governments for any kind of action that turns out to be unnecessary, calling it wasteful, an overreaction, bad management etc., and that discourages governments from exactly the sort of 'just in case' planning that we need. Hospitals always running with a higher percentage of empty beds is good preparation for emergencies but expensive and so we don't do it (other countries do, a lot more).

This is a useful list of zoonotic (from animals) diseases that we already know about, even before COVID:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoonosis#Lists_of_diseases

The Black Death in the 14th century was the first of many! It's not lack of experience that's responsible for us not being more ready - it's short term thinking, and not believing things are really likely to go that wrong any time soon, and not wanting to 'waste' money until we're sure it's really necessary too late. Not fighting or preparing for climate change will be the next big example of that.