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It is a race between variants and vaccines... and the variants are winning. I think the only solution is to engineer a benign variant of the virus... one that
by flowerlad 5y ago
It is a race between variants and vaccines... and the variants are winning.
I think the only solution is to engineer a benign variant of the virus... one that spreads easily but doesn't make people sick, and yet gives full immunity to those who are infected with it. Then gather all the anti-vaxxers by offering them free concert, pizza and beer, and secretly release the benign variant on them!
This is the only way to immunize the entire country. Once infected with the benign variant, the anti-vaxxers can be encouraged to go to concerts, crowded places, not wear masks, and so on. The benign variant will soon be the dominant variant, displacing all other variants!
- hartator 5y ago> secretly release the benign variant on them Well, no. No need to hate on each other.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- jerf 5y agoCurrently on HN's front page: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28077258 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28077258
- programmarchy 5y agoNot endorsing your rudeness, but there’s actually a technique called variolation that does something similar by purposely exposing people to low loads of a wild virus so their immune system has an advantage. Variolation could be a good argument for masking in public.
- flowerlad 5y agoBut variolation requires manually treating people one by one. We need a better way -- which is to convert the virus itself into a vaccine, which will then spread automatically in a community.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- karagenit 5y agoThis actually isn't the first time I've heard of this being suggested. A post with more details of how this could be implemented got pretty popular on here about a year and a half ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22830320 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22830320
- flowerlad 5y agoWow, that's cool! It is interesting that actual scientists have thought of the same idea. The idea may still be relevant given how long it is taking the entire world to be vaccinated. There is a serious risk of new even more dangerous variants emerging as long as the entire world is not vaccinated. Releasing an "attenuated variant" into communities that cannot be vaccinated quickly may still be necessary.