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Honest question here, do vaccines actually reduce the chance for covid to mutate? Spitballing, I would expect a vaccine to decrease the number of total mutation

Honest question here, do vaccines actually reduce the chance for covid to mutate? Spitballing, I would expect a vaccine to decrease the number of total mutations that can occur but also simultaneously increase the selective pressure on the virus, increasing the chance that any mutations that improve the virus’ ability to resist the vaccine become dominant. To make an analogy, does spraying every surface in a hospital with an antibacterial solution result in no bacteria or just make it more likely to see resistant bacteria? I’d guess it’s a function of how potent the solution was and how well every last surface was coated. If you start with a 10% solution, don’t achieve full coverage and keep ramping up slowly perhaps we’ll just see something like this: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=plVk4NVIUh8 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=plVk4NVIUh8 Agree with the rest of your post though.

smt88 5y ago
You're correct that it's possible for vaccines to be distributed in a way that promotes mutations[1]. You're also correct that there are many factors, including number of times the virus replicates and also selective pressure. At this point, it looks like our mRNA vaccines: - leave a short enough window between doses to minimize mutations - reduce viral load within a vaccinated person[2] - prevent many transmissions entirely[3][4][5] ...which, added all up, appears to net out the way you'd expect: the vaccine reduces the risk of mutations. 1. https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/02/10/965940914/covid-19-vaccines-could-add-fuel-to-evolution-of-more-coronavirus-mutations https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/02/10/9659409... 2. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-021-01316-7 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-021-01316-7 3. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/science/science-briefs/fully-vaccinated-people.html https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/science/science-br... 4. https://www.physiciansweekly.com/covid-19-breakthrough-infections-involve-lower-viral-load-following-mrna-vaccination/ https://www.physiciansweekly.com/covid-19-breakthrough-infec... 5. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-crucial-vaccine-benefit-were-not-talking-about-enough1/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-crucial-vacci...

smt88 5y ago

You're correct that it's possible for vaccines to be distributed in a way that promotes mutations[1]. You're also correct that there are many factors, including number of times the virus replicates and also selective pressure. At this point, it looks like our mRNA vaccines: - leave a short enough window between doses to minimize mutations - reduce viral load within a vaccinated person[2] - prevent many transmissions entirely[3][4][5] ...which, added all up, appears to net out the way you'd expect: the vaccine reduces the risk of mutations. 1. https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/02/10/965940914/covid-19-vaccines-could-add-fuel-to-evolution-of-more-coronavirus-mutations https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/02/10/9659409... 2. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-021-01316-7 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-021-01316-7 3. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/science/science-briefs/fully-vaccinated-people.html https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/science/science-br... 4. https://www.physiciansweekly.com/covid-19-breakthrough-infections-involve-lower-viral-load-following-mrna-vaccination/ https://www.physiciansweekly.com/covid-19-breakthrough-infec... 5. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-crucial-vaccine-benefit-were-not-talking-about-enough1/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-crucial-vacci...