Capitol Hill Blue Forums Science and Technology Health, Medicine & the healing Sciences Coronavirus: The Plague of The 21st Century?

COVID-19 is the problem we are facing now, but scientists have identified more than 1,400 coronavirus in animals, and any one of them has the capability to jump from animal to human at any given time. We should be thankful that

1) COVID-19 is orders of magnitude less deadly than MERS and SARS.

2) It's R naught is only about 3, by contrast, the R naught of measles is about 18.

3) It takes a while to incubate. MERS and SARS stopped pretty quickly because it killed people so fast they didn't have time to pass it on.

It's not too hard to imagine that the next coronavirus to jump from animal to human could have the deadliness of MERS and SARS, the R naught of measles, and having the same incubation period as COVID-19. It would make the Spanish Flu of 1918 look like a walk in the park, and could very easily kill between 1 and 2 billion people. A virus like that can write it's own science fiction novel, but lurking out there might be a virus that is no longer science fiction. A virus like that could become the next dominant life form on planet earth, replacing humans, and that thought is scary as hell.

The science fiction/horror book has already been written.

"The Stand" by Stephen King.

It should have stood as a warning. The 'rona isn't all that deadly as plagues go, but the next one might be.

When animals foul their nests usually disease and death is not far behind.

Nope, not possible. Viruses are not even alive, technically. They are more like computer viruses, depending on interconnected computers to reproduce. Without living hosts, viruses can't continue to reproduce or even to maintain viability. Higher organisms like anthrax can form spores and remain viable for years outside of hosts, but that is something a virus can't do.

An important outcome of all the SARS-COV2 research is all the general antiviral things we have discovered. Lots of them are not specific to this virus. Because of conservation of genetic capability, many other virus strains use the same mechanisms as SARS-COV2. (That means that once a particular gene has proved useful for a function, the descendants of that organism keep that gene.)

This means that any non-antibody and non-vaccine treatment for SARS-COV2 will probably be just as useful for any other RNA corona virus. Most will probably be useful against more virus strains, like Vitamin D and NAC for flu. SARS-COV2 is not really that deadly. The main reason people die from it is their own autoimmune response, and we actually know how to deal with that now.

The retrovirus that causes the common cold is also a type of coronavirus. No cure or vaccine has ever been found for it, and people have been trying for decades.

Colds actually have many many different strains, but none of them are retroviruses. A retrovirus inserts it's own DNA analog into the host nucleus, so the host cells make more virus RNA. The best example of a retrovirus is HIV. Yes, it's very difficult to make a vaccine for that.

We can make cold vaccines quite easily. It's decades-old technology. And they work fine. BUT (and it's a huge but) they only work against that strain. There are a hundred+ other strains that will cause more colds. In fact we sort of do that, by making antibodies against a strain we catch. Then we can't catch that strain for a while, a few years to a lifetime. So it's not that we can't make such a vaccine: It's just useless and making it would have no return on investment.

One thing I find disturbing is that we have seen a lot of publicity about home "blood-drop" SARS-COV2 antibody tests, but after months of this you still can't buy one. There are some very good antibody tests available but they all require you to go to a doctor's office or a diagnostic center for the sample collection. Going to either of these places is a very bad idea for high-risk individuals.

If you live in a state with an increased case outbreak, it's a really really bad idea! In my case, I suspect my wife and I have both had it, but we have no test confirmation of that. I am in a very high risk group. If we knew my wife is positive for antibodies, we would not worry so much about her food shopping trips endangering me. I think the FDA is creating unnecessary hazards and hardships in this case.

Even if home antibody testing is not perfect, a lot of us could do a much better job of controlling our own exposure risks if we had this information. Instead of that, people just give up and then go out and catch it.

If we were to find out we were positive for Covid-19, even though we never had it and 14 days go by and it doesn't develop into a full-blown sickness, are we good to go at that point? Or is caution still required?

If I was negative and then suddenly developed antibodies, I would watch for inflammation, clotting, stroke, etc. symptoms very carefully for about a month. Those can happen even to people who had asymptomatic cases. After that month, you are really in the clear.

I think a positive antibody test actually does mean you are unlikely to catch it again. Even if your antibody level drops over time, your memory B cells will know how to crank out more antibody very quickly. It would be a good idea to avoid being exposed to heavy viral loads and mutated strains, but I would not hesitate to work in a normal job or go food shopping. Eating in restaurants, probably no. Takeout, probably yes.

One thing you might want to do is to donate plasma to help somebody else. I would still wear a mask in public, just to serve as a good example to others. If I was single, would I hook up with strangers? I think I would restrict that to people with positive antibody tests as well. Kind of like hook-ups in the age of AIDS without PReP.

Thanks for your post P_I_A.

Here's a detailed picture from Gallup on how Americans view the Virus situation.

"Assessment of U.S. COVID-19 Situation Increasingly Bleak"

https://news.gallup.com/poll/313415...nt=morelink&utm_campaign=syndication