Surge testing area - South African Variant

[mrshoho]

Three days ago it was reported that a small number of cases had been detected in our borough and that rapid surge testing in targeted local areas would commence. Only heard today that our street is included but we've had nothing at all. There's not much rapid about any of it. All the while we're all carrying on with school and work, food shopping and public transport etc. We're still in lockdown so transmission is restricted but what's it going to be like when we are all mixing more? If this particular variant could be 70% more transmissible I don't have great faith in keeping it controlled. There's so many mixed messages about the effectiveness of the vaccine with this variant that I'm finding it hard to feel positive. Three of my household have been having LFTs so some reassurance I suppose even if only 50% accuracy.

There's so many mixed messages about the effectiveness of the vaccine with this variant that I'm finding it hard to feel positive.

Vaccines give your immune system a head start in dealing with the virus - you still get infected, but are able to deal with the infection much faster.

Think about it like a car trying to break to avoid crashing into a pedestrian. If the car is doing 20 mph when the driver hits the brakes, the car stops just in time. This is like where vaccines are so good they stop people from testing +ve for the virus.

Now imagine same scenario, but the car is doing 21 mph. The car needs a little longer to stop and ends up just touching the pedestrian. This is where the immune response is a little slower and you DO test +ve - but the pedestrian in both cases is unharmed!

A lot of attention has focused on how the SA variant is only 10% effective at stopping infections (they mean +ve tests) - but this is only a small part of the picture. Other evidence seems to show the antibodies generated are effective still.

In short, while it's quite likely that if you got infected with the SA strain, you'd test +ve, the vaccine is still going to work almost as well as against the UK strain, at preventing serious disease/death.

Thank you @notrub that does make a lot of sense. I'm not worried about me but more my elderly parents I support as well as cev husband. I work in a school and my teens are also back and it suddenly felt like I could be putting those vulnerable at risk again. If the worst is a mild infection it doesn't seem so bad.

There isn't full data available yet, but my bet is that the risks are higher than they are against the Kent variant, but still considerably lower than for unvaccinated people against the Kent variant.

The biggest concern currently over the mutations is that if people's immune systems are a bit slower, it means the impact of vaccination on R may be less pronounced, and if infections start rising again, that introduces other concerns including the development of further, worse mutations. So while on a personal level I wouldn't say you haven't ANYTHING to worry about, risk levels haven't changed much.

Thanks, it's reassuring (I think!) but also realistic to keep distancing measures whilst also getting on with life as normally as we can. This is not going to be over any time soon.