Andy Larsen answers the big questions about the new COVID-19 variant, including why we don’t know if it’s still here.
(AP Photo / Frank Augstein) The police stand next to an electronic notice notifying them of the coronavirus test to help clean up a cargo, truck and passenger portfolio outside the Port of Dover in Dover, England, Wednesday, 23 December 2020. Freight from Britain and passengers tested negative for the virus began to reach the French coasts, after France relaxed a two-day blockade because of a new variant of the virus. The blockade isolated Britain, arrested thousands of drivers and heightened fear of scarcity.
2020 has one last surprise in store for us?
After a few weeks of study, we gained some real knowledge of what is happening here – where our fears were realized and where they did not happen. Both the science of the variant and its potential consequences are very interesting, so let’s look at the current state of research. But first, let me answer the question that I know is on your mind. This one? Is it in the United States or even Utah? The quick answer is we don’t know, keep reading and I’ll explain why.
How did we discover the new variant?
In Kent County, southeastern England, scientists were trying to find out what was behind an unexpected rise in infections. They genetically sequenced samples from some patients and found something they didn’t expect – a variant of the coronavirus that was significantly different from what normally spreads in the area.
And it turns out that viral changes can be significant. Often, mutations don’t really do anything – like a sentence with a typo, the meaning of the genetic language remains the same, even with one or two different letters. The body reads the sentence in the normal way anyway.
But in this variant, typos really seem to matter. One of the mutations was conjectured to make it easier for the virus to bind to human cells. Another mutation can sometimes help the virus to sneak through the human immune response.
Gosh. If the virus usually undergoes one or two mutations per month, how did this variant get 17 changes without us noticing it?
A 45-year-old man saw repeated mutations in his coronavirus over a 5-month battle with the disease.
Most of the time, these viral changes die with the individual involved. After all, the long-term patient with COVID-19 is usually in a hospital, minimizing the chance of giving it to someone else. In this case, however, it seems that the variant has escaped into the world.
What is the difference between a variant and a strain?
It should be noted that we are not dealing with a new coronavirus “strain”, but with a new “variant”. Basically, think like this: the SARS-CoV-2 that caused this pandemic is a different strain from the SARS-CoV-1 virus that caused the 2003 pandemic. The level of mutation that we see in this virus in the UK is nowhere near significant enough to reach the level of the term “strain”.
Does this variant make the coronavirus more contagious?
We are still discovering that. To do this, we compare how quickly the new variant spreads compared to the other variants in the UK
Regardless of the number, remember that these estimates are all based on circumstantial evidence. What is happening in the UK may be due to other factors: what if the variant first spread to a particularly social or careless group of people? This may be enough to explain the differences.
But wait! We also found that people with the variant also have, on average, higher viral loads in their throat. This may explain, in part, why we see the greatest spread: patients with the variant are able to spread more virus particles than normal.
So, although we don’t know for sure, we have a proposed biological mechanism for increasing contagion, an epidemiological mechanism for increasing contagion, and when we count the cases, we see an increase in contagion. I think the conclusion that the variant is more contagious is relatively safe, although we want to do more research to find out exactly how much more contagious it is.
Does the variant cause more serious illnesses?
However, the authorities offer a limitation: most people who have had their coronavirus infections sequenced are under the age of 60. It is good that we do not see this variant kill a large number of young people, but we do not really know what happens to the elderly.
Is the new variant in the US?
We haven’t found it, but this is due to a curious difference in the number of coronavirus samples that we have sequenced in our country compared to the United Kingdom. On Wednesday, the United States sequenced 37 samples of coronavirus across the month of December. In the UK, researchers sequenced 3,774 samples over the same period.
Epidemiologist Trevor Bedford analyzes the number of samples sequenced over time in the UK compared to the USA (Source: https://twitter.com/trvrb/status/1341806686965665792)
Will vaccines work in the new variant?
We think vaccines will almost certainly still work, but we are checking to be sure.
It is reasonable to be a little scared – after all, many of the mutations are in the section of the genetic code that creates the virus’s spike protein, which is also the target of our vaccines. If that peak changes radically, vaccines may become ineffective.
But, if that were the case, the variant would probably also escape the antibodies that are created when people contract the coronavirus. This means that people who have been sick can become sick again. But in England, they are not seeing reinfections. In short, natural antibodies still work, so there is good reason to think that vaccine antibodies will work, too.
There is a chance that the vaccine will not be as effective in this variant as in others, but we are talking about percentage points, not a revolutionary failure. Both Moderna and Pfizer say their scientists will run experiments to find out more.
What impact will the variant have on the final stages of the pandemic?
Well, it can wreak havoc.
Rt.live’s breakdown of the effective contagion rate – Rt – in the 50 states of America on December 24.
But if the new variant started to spread in the United States and did it faster than we can vaccinate people, our current containment measures would not be enough. Our R of 1 would turn into an R of 1.56 or more, and we would see cases start to double in a few weeks. Without change, they would continue to grow exponentially and our hospitals would be invaded.
Our hope is that Britain’s containment efforts have been successful and that we can increase vaccinations in time to beat the new variant. Giving at least 60% of people a 90% effective vaccine is an really effective way to reduce coronavirus in a community.
But the variant has the potential to increase the pressure of the vaccination race, there is no doubt about it. Administering the doses to as many people as possible as quickly as possible has always been important, but especially in the case of a change in the coronavirus that is especially contagious.