Coronavirus 2019-2020 thread (no unsubstantiated rumours!)
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Ridiculous scaremongering caused by a media that blows the death rates for the new variants out of proportion.
In reality, the majority of the population already had a low chance of dying from corona, and adding vaccines on top of that drops the rate even further.
If the corona evolved to become more lethal, then its symptoms would be more apparent, reducing its ability to transmit silently (the justification for lockdowns). If the opposite happened, then corona would end up even milder than the seasonal flu. And we all know that there is zero defensible reason to destroy the economy over a handful of flu deaths.
So you ignore my major points and go off riding your little hobby horse.
My first major point was that allowing high infection rates in China would risk the evolution of a truly lethal strain. You apparently acknowledge this point, but you don't seem to mind allowing some Chinese to die in order to demonstrate the deadliness of a new strain. Thanks for your "advice", but no thanks.
I prefer to prevent forseeable catastrophes, rather than allow them to happen and attempt to recover from them.
My second major point was, if it ain't broke, why fix it? China's infection rate is very low, and her economy is booming. Why mess with a good thing? Unless you (and @Phead128, and @supersnoop) WANT the Middle Kingdom to do something stupid.
Okay, but Indian Variant Factory exists, and Deer population has 70% infection of SAR-CoV-2, where it thrives and mutate. Not to mention Bats, Civets, Dogs, Cats are all getting infected by SAR-CoV-2 virus (no symptoms), but they will thrive and mutate there as well.
Are you going to slaughter all the Dogs/Cats/Bats/Deer population to eradicate the disease? Or are you going to vaccinate all the Dogs/Cats/Bats/Deers to eradicate the disease? Realistically speaking, you cannot eradicate this disease because of the animal host reservoir population.
It can jump from bats to humans anytime (again), even if China closes it's borders to foreigners.
Nothing is broken, we are just saying China should get to 100% vaccination rate, then gradually abandon lockdowns which hurt GDP and can be exploited by US CIA or foreign powers looking to destabilize China.
I think the point is..... after 100% vaccination rate.... China's economy can grow even faster without sporadic lockdowns that hurt business confidence and tourism and GDP growth.
Why is it stupid to return back to normal after 100% vaccinate rate and nobody dies? You rather spend 1% of GDP growth for every 100 mild/moderate infection prevented? Do you know how easily US CIA can exploit this to cause outbreaks and trigger lockdowns over a dozen cases?
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If you keep it circulating in animals, it will adapt to the animal populations and away from human adaptation.
Currently there's both an animal AND human reservoir.
Using your logic, since they are "so adapted" to animal host reservoirs, they would never mutate to jump to human population right?
How do you explain how SARS 2003 jumped from Pangolins or Civets, or how SARs-CoV-2 jumped from Bats or Pangolins to Humans?
"Mutations" don't adapt, they just happen if you have enough replications of the virus. They might evolve to be less lethal in the host population, but mutations do not adapt. They can just randomly happen.
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I am not a subject matter expert in biology. However, from my understanding of biochemistry, it is true that while any given mutation doesn't adapt and is random, the cumulative sum of mutations that result in significant phenotypical changes IS adaptive. Natural selection dictates that. Maladaptive mutations are wiped out.
Here's an example of directed evolution in virus culturing that predates COVID, demonstrating that cultured viruses lose virulence compared to wild type due to mutations to adapt to the cell culture. When reexposed to mice, they regained virulence through genetic changes. This shows that the net effect of mutations is adaptation.
Latest from NHC:
99 new confirmed cases, 52 of them imported, 47 domestic (Jiangxu 26 (Nanjing 1, Yangzhou 25), Henan 14, Hubei 4, Hunan 2, Yunnan 1)
34 new asymptomatic carriers, 29 imported, 5 domestic (Hubei 3, Hunan 2).
33 asymptomatic carriers converted to new cases (20 imported, 13 domestic)
Yangzhou is well down from peak now
99 new confirmed cases, 52 of them imported, 47 domestic (Jiangxu 26 (Nanjing 1, Yangzhou 25), Henan 14, Hubei 4, Hunan 2, Yunnan 1)
34 new asymptomatic carriers, 29 imported, 5 domestic (Hubei 3, Hunan 2).
33 asymptomatic carriers converted to new cases (20 imported, 13 domestic)
Yangzhou is well down from peak now