4 ms·

I'm really afraid it will mutate into something more serious as well as being as virulent as it current is. That would be really really bad.

gibbonsrcool 5y ago
I keep thinking about this. If you combine the probabilities that the virus will evade vaccines along with it mutating to be deadly, the combination is probably a very small number. However, Omicron is spreading all over the world which increases the chance this happens.
- jacquesm 5y ago
  And this being an RNA virus it can and will change again, and what the parameters of that next version will be is anybody's guess.
dude187 5y ago
That is not what typically happens though. There's no reason to expect it. It would be an anomaly
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- heavyset_go 5y ago
  Except that happens all of the time, there's plenty of reason to expect it and it wouldn't be an anomaly. From the AP's "Viruses can evolve to be more deadly" article[1]: > Day said there are documented cases of animal viruses that evolved over time to become more lethal, including myxoma virus in rabbits and Marek’s disease in chicken. > Some viruses provoke severe symptoms in their hosts that make it easier to transmit the virus to others. But those same symptoms can wind up killing the hosts. > Adalja said one example is Ebola, a deadly virus that spreads through the blood and body fluids of infected people. Another example is norovirus, which causes diarrhea and vomiting, and leads to hundreds of deaths each year in the U.S. > “The virus, speaking anthropomorphically, just wants to spread and have its genes replicated,” said Adalja. “If the best way for it is to spread by causing severe symptoms it will continue to do that.” [1] https://apnews.com/article/fact-checking-011488089270 https://apnews.com/article/fact-checking-011488089270
  - dude187 5y ago
    That's not the norm, that's the unexpected anomaly
    - jacquesm 5y ago
      No, that's the norm. The people that are repeating the 'viruses evolve to become more benign' line are about 40 years behind the times in terms of science as it is currently accepted. Viruses evolve to spread as efficiently as possible, what happens to the host after they have spread is from a viral evolution point of view utterly irrelevant. So they can and do evolve to be more lethal. Maybe it takes a bit longer before you die but that's perfectly fine.
      - dude187 5y ago
        > No, that's the norm. How is the norm for viruses to continue to become more lethal? That does not align with anything I've ever heard. That link doesn't even claim that, and that's a baseless "fact check" done by a mathematician acting as a false authority.
        jacquesm 5y ago
        > How is the norm for viruses to continue to become more lethal? The norm is for viruses to end up somewhere in the middle, but chances are that the lethality is still very high. The whole idea that viruses evolve to be less lethal simply isn't true and very much outdated. > That does not align with anything I've ever heard. That is possible, it is a pretty persistent thing but it has been dealt with decisively since the 80's: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/224043344_Coevolution_Of_Hosts_and_Parasites https://www.researchgate.net/publication/224043344_Coevoluti... In a nutshell: it is likely that viruses (and other parasites) change once they have made their jump to a new species. This change is mostly random, selection pressure will lead to maximizing for R0, which may or may not lead to a lower level of lethality but this is by no means guaranteed. Some outliers may evolve to become more lethal, some other outliers may evolve to be (much) less lethal, but for the bulk an intermediary level of lethality (which can still be very high) is the normal outcome. This is experimentally confirmed over and over again over the timescales that we have been doing these. The shortest way in which you can condense all this is: "to a virus it is replication that matters, not what happens to the host after it has replicated". Of course viruses don't have any conscious plan but the evolutionary mechanism selects for (more) successful reproduction so it will seem like that from the outside.
bruce511 5y ago
Truly deadly virus's don't kill a lot of people. Evolutionally speaking, it's not to their advantage to do so. Take Ebola (a well known virus, with very high mortality). It's very hard for Ebola to spread. It tends to make people obviously sick, and also kills quick, both of which make it much much easier to control. I'm guessing you don't spend a lot of time or energy avoiding Ebola. Contrast to AIDS, which did not make people sick, and so was easier to catch from a seemingly healthy person. From an AIDS perspective weakening the immune system against other diseases was a flaw in the plan. Once it became rampant though there were (and are) behavioral changes to reduce the chance of infection. Those behaviors are now "normal" because, well, AIDS. The "common cold" / flu etc are all covid, or covid-like viruses that constantly mutate and constantly do the rounds. We develop immunity over time and they mutate into milder (but more infectious) versions. We take steps to avoid these, but meh, if you get it you get it. Some behaviors from this pandemic will remain (stop letting - or worse requiring - obviously sick people come to work for example) - others will fall away (I don't see the mask thing sticking around forever...) We'll probably work from home more than we did before, but that was already a trend, this has just accelerated it. Even when we get back to normal I don't think I'll be flying to a city for random meetings anymore.
- jacquesm 5y ago
  But HIV/AIDS does kill a lot of people.
  - bruce511 5y ago
    Technically it doesn't - people don't die Of Aids they die With Aids. But that's semantics. The point is that Aids has a long time between infection and death, thus encouraging spread.
    - jacquesm 5y ago
      Which is why you can't say that "Truly deadly virus's don't kill a lot of people." They can, and they do, there are many examples besides HIV.
berberous 5y ago
virulent means serious (in its effects), not easily spread.
- 2-718-281-828 5y ago
  that's what he is writing.

gibbonsrcool 5y ago

I keep thinking about this. If you combine the probabilities that the virus will evade vaccines along with it mutating to be deadly, the combination is probably a very small number. However, Omicron is spreading all over the world which increases the chance this happens.

jacquesm 5y ago
And this being an RNA virus it can and will change again, and what the parameters of that next version will be is anybody's guess.

dude187 5y ago

That is not what typically happens though. There's no reason to expect it. It would be an anomaly

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
heavyset_go 5y ago
Except that happens all of the time, there's plenty of reason to expect it and it wouldn't be an anomaly. From the AP's "Viruses can evolve to be more deadly" article[1]: > Day said there are documented cases of animal viruses that evolved over time to become more lethal, including myxoma virus in rabbits and Marek’s disease in chicken. > Some viruses provoke severe symptoms in their hosts that make it easier to transmit the virus to others. But those same symptoms can wind up killing the hosts. > Adalja said one example is Ebola, a deadly virus that spreads through the blood and body fluids of infected people. Another example is norovirus, which causes diarrhea and vomiting, and leads to hundreds of deaths each year in the U.S. > “The virus, speaking anthropomorphically, just wants to spread and have its genes replicated,” said Adalja. “If the best way for it is to spread by causing severe symptoms it will continue to do that.” [1] https://apnews.com/article/fact-checking-011488089270 https://apnews.com/article/fact-checking-011488089270
- dude187 5y ago
  That's not the norm, that's the unexpected anomaly
  - jacquesm 5y ago
    No, that's the norm. The people that are repeating the 'viruses evolve to become more benign' line are about 40 years behind the times in terms of science as it is currently accepted. Viruses evolve to spread as efficiently as possible, what happens to the host after they have spread is from a viral evolution point of view utterly irrelevant. So they can and do evolve to be more lethal. Maybe it takes a bit longer before you die but that's perfectly fine.
    - dude187 5y ago
      > No, that's the norm. How is the norm for viruses to continue to become more lethal? That does not align with anything I've ever heard. That link doesn't even claim that, and that's a baseless "fact check" done by a mathematician acting as a false authority.
      - jacquesm 5y ago
        > How is the norm for viruses to continue to become more lethal? The norm is for viruses to end up somewhere in the middle, but chances are that the lethality is still very high. The whole idea that viruses evolve to be less lethal simply isn't true and very much outdated. > That does not align with anything I've ever heard. That is possible, it is a pretty persistent thing but it has been dealt with decisively since the 80's: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/224043344_Coevolution_Of_Hosts_and_Parasites https://www.researchgate.net/publication/224043344_Coevoluti... In a nutshell: it is likely that viruses (and other parasites) change once they have made their jump to a new species. This change is mostly random, selection pressure will lead to maximizing for R0, which may or may not lead to a lower level of lethality but this is by no means guaranteed. Some outliers may evolve to become more lethal, some other outliers may evolve to be (much) less lethal, but for the bulk an intermediary level of lethality (which can still be very high) is the normal outcome. This is experimentally confirmed over and over again over the timescales that we have been doing these. The shortest way in which you can condense all this is: "to a virus it is replication that matters, not what happens to the host after it has replicated". Of course viruses don't have any conscious plan but the evolutionary mechanism selects for (more) successful reproduction so it will seem like that from the outside.

bruce511 5y ago

Truly deadly virus's don't kill a lot of people. Evolutionally speaking, it's not to their advantage to do so. Take Ebola (a well known virus, with very high mortality). It's very hard for Ebola to spread. It tends to make people obviously sick, and also kills quick, both of which make it much much easier to control. I'm guessing you don't spend a lot of time or energy avoiding Ebola. Contrast to AIDS, which did not make people sick, and so was easier to catch from a seemingly healthy person. From an AIDS perspective weakening the immune system against other diseases was a flaw in the plan. Once it became rampant though there were (and are) behavioral changes to reduce the chance of infection. Those behaviors are now "normal" because, well, AIDS. The "common cold" / flu etc are all covid, or covid-like viruses that constantly mutate and constantly do the rounds. We develop immunity over time and they mutate into milder (but more infectious) versions. We take steps to avoid these, but meh, if you get it you get it. Some behaviors from this pandemic will remain (stop letting - or worse requiring - obviously sick people come to work for example) - others will fall away (I don't see the mask thing sticking around forever...) We'll probably work from home more than we did before, but that was already a trend, this has just accelerated it. Even when we get back to normal I don't think I'll be flying to a city for random meetings anymore.

jacquesm 5y ago
But HIV/AIDS does kill a lot of people.
- bruce511 5y ago
  Technically it doesn't - people don't die Of Aids they die With Aids. But that's semantics. The point is that Aids has a long time between infection and death, thus encouraging spread.
  - jacquesm 5y ago
    Which is why you can't say that "Truly deadly virus's don't kill a lot of people." They can, and they do, there are many examples besides HIV.

berberous 5y ago

virulent means serious (in its effects), not easily spread.

2-718-281-828 5y ago
that's what he is writing.