4 ms·
This is a myth, or a misunderstanding. SARS-CoV-2 does most of its transmitting before serious symptoms develop. The severity of those symptoms has no bearing o
by twic 5y ago
This is a myth, or a misunderstanding. SARS-CoV-2 does most of its transmitting before serious symptoms develop. The severity of those symptoms has no bearing on the fitness of the virus. We should not expect SARS-CoV-2 to evolve to be less lethal.
https://twitter.com/BallouxFrancois/status/1276802978582679552 https://twitter.com/BallouxFrancois/status/12768029785826795...
There are other pathogens which we would indeed expect to evolve to become less lethal. On the other hand, there are some which evolve to be more lethal, like Dengue.
- londons_explore 5y agoI wonder if a viable strategy for a future pandemic outbreak might be to deliberately encourage less lethal mutations to survive by, for example, having lockdowns that apply to contacts, friends and relatives of someone who died only?
- GekkePrutser 5y agoOn the other hand, we will be fighting less lethal variants much less. Less lockdowns and other hard measures, vaccines will be targeted at the more deadly variants obviously. That will play a role too in the long run. But it could take longer as it's not a direct effect.