While California is still seeing huge declines in COVID-19 after the recent holiday boom, there is growing concern about another potential issue waiting around the corner.
New research strongly suggests that the coronavirus strain now prevalent in California not only spreads more easily than its predecessors, but that it also has the ability to evade antibodies generated by COVID-19 vaccines or previous infection. It is also associated with serious illnesses and deaths.
According to the features, scientists are concerned that the homemade variant could reverse the state’s recent progress in reducing new infections, especially if it could swap mutations with other threatening strains. Experts said it stressed the need to vaccinate people as quickly as possible and to continue to wear masks, maintain social distance and take other measures for public health as the state begins to reopen more.
Five provinces are now eligible to open indoor activities at restaurant-dining rooms, gyms, movie theaters, museums, zoos and aquariums amid a dramatic improvement in the COVID-19 pandemic, Government Gavin Newsom said Tuesday. Other provinces are likely to follow soon as things continue to fall.
Many pandemic indicators continue to improve dramatically. California now takes over about 6,000 new cases of coronavirus per day, down from 45,000 a day from six weeks ago. The number of COVID-19 patients in California hospitals was 6,569 on Sunday, down from 21,936 on January 6th.
Can California tensions undo this progress? Here’s what we know about the variant that probably appeared in the state in May:
Is the tension in California a big deal?
California, along with the rest of the country, was support for an assessment of a more transferable voltage from the United Kingdom known as B.1.1.7. But the California tribe is probably just as concerned, and it has already settled. By the end of next month, the homemade strain – which scientists call B.1.427 / B.1.429 – is likely to make up 90% of the state’s coronavirus infections, he said. Dr Charles Chiu, a researcher and physician on infectious disease at UC San Francisco.
Samples collected by different methods from different provinces indicate that the variant is 19% to 24% more transferable.
Chiu and his colleagues at UCSF say the group of mutations that are characteristic the homemade stem should indicate it as a “variety of concern” on the same level as the United Kingdom, South Africa and Brazil.
What makes scientists think it’s more transferable?
Researchers have seen uniform patterns in the way the variant has spread across provinces across the state. And as coronavirus infections spread across the country, they usually did so along with increasing evidence of the presence of the California tribe.
There is also evidence from laboratory tests. An analysis of viral samples from across the state showed that, compared to people infected with other SARS-CoV-2 strains, those infected with the California strain had viral fats in the nasopharynx that were twice as high. was so high. This made the probability that each person infected with the new strain would infect more people.
The genome of B.1.427 / B.1.429 contains three mutations that affect the ear protein of the virus, which it uses to sneak into human cells and converts it into factories for its own reproduction. One of the three mutations, called L452R, affects the so-called receptor binding domain, to help attach the virus firmer to target cells.
Is it dangerous in other ways?
The L452R mutations also seem to make the stress in California more harmful to the body.
A coronavirus designed to have only the mutation is capable of infecting human lung tissue at least 40% more easily than other variants now in circulation, without the mutation. Compared to the so-called wild-type strains, the engineered virus was also more than three times more contagious.
Dr. Bruce Walker, an immunologist and founding director of the Ragon Institute in Boston, said that although viruses often mutate in ways that make them stronger, such genetic changes often yield a new Achilles heel. For example, a strain that spreads more easily often loses some virulence.
The worrying thing about the California variant, Walker said, is that no obvious weakness has been introduced along with mutations that give extra power.
How does it fare against COVID-19 vaccines?
In the laboratory, the California strain was more resistant to the neutralizing antibodies generated in response to COVID-19 vaccines or by a previous coronavirus infection. Compared to existing variants, the reduction in protection was ‘moderate … but significant’, UCSF researchers said.
When the neutralizing antibodies went up against the homemade stem, its effectiveness was cut in half. For comparison, when these antibodies experience the coronavirus strain now dominant in South Africa, their effectiveness has been reduced to one-sixth of their usual levels.
“I expect over time that this is going to have an effect on the vaccination,” Chiu said. Although the extent of the effect varies from sample to sample and is less pronounced than with the South African tribe, “it is still worrying,” he said.
Is this tension to blame for the state holiday?
Not quite, but it was probably one of the many contributors to the boom that plagued the state through the fall and early winter.
At least in Northern California, new infections had already begun to rise dramatically when the new variant announced its presence, Chiu said. Across Southern California, the overlap was closer.
What is the ‘nightmare scenario’ with this variant?
The UK and California variants are each armed with improved capabilities, and the likelihood of them spreading to the same population increases the spectacle of a return to infections and deaths, Chiu said. It also opens the door to the possibility that the two viruses will meet in a single person, swap their mutations and create an even more dangerous strain of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
Chiu calls it a ‘nightmare scenario’.
Dr. Anthony Faucia country’s leading expert in infectious diseases, has expressed further concern: Survival of the strongest match between the British and California variants could spread the strain that is best able to withstand the effects of COVID-19 vaccines to evade, accelerate. . The best way to prevent this, he added, is to stop the spread of any variant by being vaccinated, wearing masks and limiting exposure to others.