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"Viruses live on a delicate balance, don’t they? They have to be able to thrive without killing their host. Right. The ones that kill off their host quickly wi
by tomerbd 7y ago
"Viruses live on a delicate balance, don’t they? They have to be able to thrive without killing their host.
Right. The ones that kill off their host quickly will disappear. With the SARS virus, it’s no surprise that killing 10 percent of its host, it wasn’t able to establish itself as a pandemic virus on this planet."
- bryanrasmussen 7y agoa virus could kill 100% of its host, as long as it took a long time to do so while the host was still able to go around and infect others. I don't think the 10% virulence is the reason (or the only reason) that SARS didn't make it to pandemic scale, I think it was everyone working against it and succeeding that time, which of course had the result of people thinking "hah, see it wasn't a problem, all those eggheads overreacting" on edit: I think my main irritation is with the governments that did not put the proper preparation in the health systems (enough ICU preparation for example) for what was a foreseeable event.
- TsomArp 7y agoIf you kill 100% of your hosts, to which other host will you go? 100% means all.
- bryanrasmussen 7y agolet's say you had a virus that was like a really low grade cold for two months, and then spiked up really suddenly and killed the host. You're right, after you kill that host you won't go anywhere but you will go lots of places that two months prior.
- playing_colours 7y agoWe have much more mobility and contacts with other people than in past, therefore it may be more efficient for viruses to evolve into having longer incubation period than becoming less lethal.
- laumars 7y agoThe GPs point was how long the host is a carrier before symptoms arise, let alone severe enough to incapacitate them. What makes COVID-19 so dangerous is the incubation period + infectiousness, not the mortality rate.
- radicalbyte 7y agoWhat if you have a virus which took 80 years to kill its host and was super effective at spreading?
- amiga_500 7y agoSurely aids falls into this category
- Someone 7y agoIf you limit your hosts to those having sufficiently grown up kids, or wait killing and invalidating them until they have, that can work fine.