New Variant

[Sqad]

Approximately 1,000 cases of a new variant of Covid 19 has been identified which is reported to transmit faster than the present one.
Mutation in simple terms and is not known if the vaccine will be effective against it.
A spanner in the works?

[emmie]

i have just looked at that, yes it could well be.

[emmie]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-55308211

[Sqad]

Thanks emmie.

[emmie]

one thing that strikes me is how do we police people coming into UK< we can vaccinate all we like, but many from overseas may not have had the vaccine. Just a thought.

[emmie]

one hopes that vaccines will evolve too, but that is going to take time, meanwhile more dying across the world.

[Peter Pedant]

we are going to have to wait and see

transmit faster just means R number is higher than with the oild one

Some ( a few ) centres have been sequencing every single virus they get their hand on - apparently not a big deal. The vaccine have been designed to act against slow mutating regions. Clearly it matter if the new mutation affects one of the selected regions
for which we will have to
wait and see

As intended - once the base vaccine has been licensed, jiggling a few amino acids to fit new ones is much much quicker

[Peter Pedant]

I too read Porton Down is on it and thought Christ we will get the answer in 2025 then

[emmie]

they just have to work together and harder. Not sure what else the scientists can do

[EdmundD]

"we are going to have to wait and see"

[emmie]

Edmund not sure about the music, Sqad makes a valid post. this isn;t going to go away any time soon,

[ladybirder]

As I am halfway through having the currently available vaccine I'll let you know ... if I'm still here!

[emmie]

LB, do let us know how you get on

[LadyCG]

Just when you thought there was an end in sight :-(

[emmie]

i think this was bound to happen, the end isn't in sight anyway, we still have millions of our citizens to vaccinate, which is going to take at least another year the way its going. Flu virus mutate don't they?

[Untitled]

Yet another hole in the herd immunity approach as if there were not enough already. What terrible news this is for everyone hoping to move on.

[Sqad]

In a nutshell:
Covid 19 is far from undercontrol.
We have a mutation that we know spreads faster than Co19 and that's about all.
We have a population, the majority of which is putting two fingers up to Government recommendations AND we have Christmas around the corner.
A vaccine which will not affect the pandemic for at least 3to 4 months.
For God's sake....lockdown for Christmas and hope for the best.

[naomi24]

Is anyone surprised when a virus mutates and then mutates again? How long can we go on running from it? Eventually we are going to have to concede that we can’t stop it - and learn to live with it.

[emmie]

i think that no matter how many tiers one introduces its not going to stop this from spreading, as i have repeatedly said its not policable one can have social distancing at sports matches, and umpteen edicts from our respective government ministers if people ignore it as many will then what can be done. AB seems to be of the opinion they will hunker down and get on with things as best they can, but that isn't the populace at large.

[emmie]

lockdown for how long Sqad, one can have 2 days or 5 days break for Christmas it won't matter how many days this will still spread

[New Judge]

He [Hancock] said there was "nothing to suggest" it caused worse disease or that vaccines would no longer work.

So that's it sorted then.

Never mind. Many areas of the south-east (including London) will join Kent tomorrow and enter "Tier 3". And a lot of good that will do (apart from destroy what's left of the hospitality industry in those areas). The only significant difference between Tiers 2 and 3 is the closure of hospitality. Well, hospitality in Kent has been closed for almost six weeks. About two weeks ago (i.e. four weeks after the pubs and restaurants closed) Swale became the area with the highest rate of infections in the country, closely followed by its neighbours Medway and Thanet. Nearby Maidstone is coming up fast on the rails. So it's not the pubs and restaurants causing that increase. I've a very good idea what is. Last week I had the unfortunate experience of shopping in my local ASDA at about 3:30pm. I never usually shop at that time but circumstances meant I had to. The shop and the surrounding precinct was mobbed out with schoolchildren who had finished school and decided to continue their activities in the shops. There were dozens of groups roaming all over the place simply passing their time in the shops. Meantime from Wednesday Mrs NJ and I will have to cancel the cosy dinners we have once a week in our local restaurants where few people arrive in groups of more than two and everybody is well distanced.

It is not hospitality or a "variant" of the virus that is responsible for increasing the spread in this country. It is schoolchildren.