How much further can covid mutate?

[Thelm]

I’m just wondering. Is there a limit as to how far a virus can mutate? Are we going to still be in a race to contain it in five years time?

I just don’t know how this will end.

I agree, it's strange. Some people make this comment every time anyone expresses any concern about covid. If you don't stick your head in the sand and pretend it doesn't exist, you're apparently loving covid and everything that goes with it.

What annoys me is that IF the likes of alternate SAGE had been listened to, rather than castigated as "lefty activists", the UK would have endured FAR less in the way of restrictions!

I'm a lockdown hater.

But the whole thing is like getting a cowboy in to fix your roof.
After you've spent a whole winter managing fifty or so strategically placed buckets, and hours on the phone trying to get the bastard to repeatedly come back and sort out the mess they made the last time round, you just want to pay a proper roofer to come and in fix it properly!

I have learnt something really interesting today. SARS-cov1, or swine flu as it is more commonly known, is around 80% similar to sars-cov2/covid. A study has been carried out on the blood of people who caught and recovered from swine flu and found that 17 years later, their t-cells still react to the swine flu virus and kill it. They still have natural immunity 17 years later to swine flu.

However, even MORE interesting is the fact that these same t-cells also reacted to the covid virus and killed that too. In other words, although the “variance” between the 2 similar viruses is 20%, t-cells were able to recognise enough of the covid virus to activate and kill this virus too.

All variants of covid to date vary by a maximum of 0.3% from the original Wuhan strain.

So why do we need to be worried about variants and why would we need booster vaccines? If it’s because vaccine deposited immunity doesn’t stimulate a t-cell response to enable memory based immunity then why aren’t we only vaccinating the over 70’s and those vulnerable and allowing everyone else, with their 99.98% chance of survival catch it naturally and improve their own chances against variants?

Something isn’t right with this picture....

And I’m not convinced by the long covid argument because that doesn’t affect the majority of people either.

@MarshaBradyo

Strange I agree re long incubation period and not needing to get milder

And in terms of variables I can imagine some worse versions but this stuff led us up pretty well

Btw did you consider the NZ question?

Sorry what question was that?

Got a bit lost in replies today tbh lol.

I don't agree with everything @strangeshapedpotato says and she is very pessimistic (I say that as someone who leans to the this is the end of the beginning rather than the beginning of the end when it comes to COVID) but...

The statement for eg of " NO evolutionary pressure on it to evolve into a milder form" has been proven to be statistically wrong with practically every virus since the human race has been on the earth.

What has statistics got to do with evolutionary pressure? She is correct, there isn't much in the way of evolutionary pressure for SARS-CoV-2 to evolve to be less virulent (harmful). There isn't a huge competitive advantage for a less virulent strain as people are infectious long before they have symptoms. There would only be an advantage in being less virulent if that meant infectious people felt fine so were out and about infecting lots more people than people infected by the more virulent strain. As people are infectious before they are symptomatic and symptoms are mild in many people, there wouldn't be much advantage for a less virulent strain. Pathogens don't always evolve to be less virulent eg TB, Dengue fever. This is an easy to understand article:

theconversation.com/will-coronavirus-really-evolve-to-become-less-deadly-153817

Spanish flu can't " do another round " as it mutated to a much milder version of it's own accord as virtually every virus does- there was no vaccine for spanish flu. The current flu we have today is related to spanish flu.

Spanish flu and swine flu are both strains of the influenza A H1N1 subtype. Mutation/recombination doesn't always result in less virulent strains becoming dominant, it can go the other way too.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Influenza_A_virus_subtype_H1N1

@Lostinacloud

I have learnt something really interesting today. SARS-cov1, or swine flu as it is more commonly known, is around 80% similar to sars-cov2/covid. A study has been carried out on the blood of people who caught and recovered from swine flu and found that 17 years later, their t-cells still react to the swine flu virus and kill it. They still have natural immunity 17 years later to swine flu.

However, even MORE interesting is the fact that these same t-cells also reacted to the covid virus and killed that too. In other words, although the “variance” between the 2 similar viruses is 20%, t-cells were able to recognise enough of the covid virus to activate and kill this virus too.

All variants of covid to date vary by a maximum of 0.3% from the original Wuhan strain.

So why do we need to be worried about variants and why would we need booster vaccines? If it’s because vaccine deposited immunity doesn’t stimulate a t-cell response to enable memory based immunity then why aren’t we only vaccinating the over 70’s and those vulnerable and allowing everyone else, with their 99.98% chance of survival catch it naturally and improve their own chances against variants?

Something isn’t right with this picture....

And I’m not convinced by the long covid argument because that doesn’t affect the majority of people either.

Err - sorry that's bonkers lol

Swine Flu is an influenza virus! Specifically the H1N1 virus.

It has zero similarity to either SARS virus.

There is absolutely NO WAY that Swine Flu T-Cells could respond to covid.

If it’s because vaccine deposited immunity doesn’t stimulate a t-cell response to enable memory based immunity

This is a nonsensical statement - just plain gobbledegook.

Oh, my post was in reply to @SallyBasingstoke's posts that now seem to have been deleted.

Lostinacloud yes I have also read about immunity to SARSCov-1 lasting 17 years and providing immunity to SARSCov-2 as well. This is good news I think, but SARSCov-1 was not swine flu.

@strangeshapedpotato annoyingly I misquoted that sars-cov1 is known as swine flu. I did of course mean the coronavirus SARS.
The rest is correct

@Lostinacloud

I’ve read what you’re referring to. It’s from either the bmj or Nature. Last I read it was research and theory but not heavily peer reviewed. I’ve also read about the gain of function research that was publicised (for funding) being carried out on SARS inserting ‘spike’ protein similar to HIV-1 to make more infectious this time. Elements of bat virus and elements of pangolin virus. And specifically, most worryingly the ‘codes’ or ‘proteins’ or ‘cleavage’ (or something) that allow covid cells to camouflage and trick/evade human cells into thinking they aren’t foreign virus. The scientific community slammed this dangerous work in 2015 as it was claimed this new SARS could effectively kill elderly mice ... and then effectively kill elderly ‘humanoid mice’.

Nice ethics!

sally

1. question 4 isn't that simple
2. why is there no question 6

[quote Lostinacloud]@strangeshapedpotato annoyingly I misquoted that sars-cov1 is known as swine flu. I did of course mean the coronavirus SARS.
The rest is correct[/quote]
OK - so what I think you are actually referring to (God i've seen this study misquoted so much recently) is about the antibodies of a single SARS-1 survivor, that were found to kill other coronaviruses.

This is about the nature of immune systems and I addressed this higher up the thread.

When shown an antigen, your immune picks the targets, which can be any of multiple possible attack sites on a virus, esp a large complex one like SARS.

With this particular individual, their immune system seems to have picked a site common to many (if not all?) coronaviruses. If a vaccine could be produced able to produce these antibodies in everyone, the world could breathe a huge sigh of relief. However, that's a challenge.

What you seem to have believed is that this response is true of all SARS-1 survivors. Nope - just the one.

Side note - this is why vaccine efficiency varies with variants and is not a works/doesn't work binary situation.

Shown the same target 100 different people's immune systems will choose different sites of attack. Some will pick targets common to multiple variants. Others will pick targets specific to a single variant.

Depending on how many immune responses are variant specific will determine how much efficacy is lost when the virus mutates.

@SallyBasingstoke

Given the fool you've made of yourself with your constant claims about flu not existing prior to 1918, I'll ignore your "questions" lol which are mostly nonsense.

I've exposed you as a covid-denier which was all I needed to do here.

I don’t think that is the same study strangeshapedpotato. It was carried out last year and concerned t-cells because they live inside a human cell and so detect any virus that attaches itself to a cell receptor so it can get inside the cell. Antibodies don’t deal with that type of cell attack.

@SallyBasingstoke

Simple questions *@strangeshapedpotato* which you cant answer

1. Why are you inferring I believe in 5g conspiracy theories when I havent mentioned 5g

2. Why do you talk about zero covid when any scientist in the world would laugh at you for talking idealistic nonsense that is not realistic

3. What viruses throughout history have mutated to become more deadly compared to the reverse actually being true?

4. Why do you state there is no evolutionary process for viruses to become less lethal when historically the vast majority become less lethal but more transmissable in order to survive? You state " becoming milder " isnt on the cards which is a lie evidenced by spanish flu and flu of today

5. "If living with it isnt what we should be considering" do you plan on ending it all ?

6)

Really @SallyBasingstoke?

1. You're right that was a low blow
2. Um any scientist? Tell that to Independent Sage www.independentsage.org/who-are-independent-sage/ www.bmj.com/content/371/bmj.m3859
3. I'll concede that Spanish flu was a new strain of H1N1 rather than a variant but how do you think new strains arise? Spontaneous generation? God? Or mutation and recombination? I already mentioned (with a link) several pathogens that have not evolved to become less virulent eg TB, Dengue fever, gonorrhea. The link also discusses Anderson and May's trade off theory to explain why pathogens might evolve to be more virulent. The CASCADE study suggested HIV became more virulent: www.ctu.mrc.ac.uk/news/news-stories/2014/december/cascade-study-suggests-hiv-has-increased-in-virulence-and-transmissibility/
4. strangeshapedpotato didn't say that there is no evolutionary process to become less lethal, she said there is no evolutionary pressure. Nor did she say that there is never any evolutionary pressure for pathogens to become less virulent, just that there wasn't any for SARS-CoV-2. You need to revise natural selection If there is no benefit in the virus becoming less virulent, less virulent variants won't be selected for. The main benefit of becoming less virulent is that your host feels fine and goes out infecting more people. That isn't the case with COVID 19 as you are infectious before you have symptoms. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_pressure
5. That was uncalled for

@Lostinacloud

I don’t think that is the same study strangeshapedpotato. It was carried out last year and concerned t-cells because they live inside a human cell and so detect any virus that attaches itself to a cell receptor so it can get inside the cell. Antibodies don’t deal with that type of cell attack.

I thought the SARS 1 was T cell too

Could be related to outcomes in those countries

[quote SallyBasingstoke]@chesirecat99 because if a virus is in the human body longer before killing that person , it will replicate more so the goal of the virus is to prioritise that over killing the infected person[/quote]
What is that in response to?