The new Variant of Covid has an increased R0 by between 40% and 80%

This is serious.

Volz and colleagues also noted a larger share of individuals under age 20 among reported cases of the variant versus non-variant cases, dubbing this "a shift in age composition." They estimated that the variant's R0 is  https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/211793/new-covid-19-variant-growing-rapidly-england/" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; color: rgb(2, 113, 193); font-family: BerninaSansWeb, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; - 40%-80% higher than for the wild-type virus . 

https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/covid19/90499 - https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/covid19/90499

And meanwhile, in colorado, kids go back to in person learning for middle and high school on Jan 25th.  I don't agree with it because the science says this is not over but parents are pushing to have kids back in school and its gotten ugly with protests and all.  Not sure whats going to happen but really concerned!

That is not just serious, it's disasterous.

Here in the UK we are in lockdown and still the NHS is creaking at the seams.

Our new strain is popping up worldwide, so are the SA and Brazilian ones.  If this is a race, we have stumbled, tripped, fallen and developed a stitch a dozen steps off of the starting blocks.  I wonder how many other new strains there are which we have not even looked at yet.

On top of all that, some people have behaved very stupidly, not a handful of people either, but a significant percentage (Just look at where Tabitha lives!).

God help us if a real slate-wiper appears, 'coz we won't help ourselves much.

I predict the virus will keep mutating.

It has increased its R0, and gone airborne

It may next increase the Case fatality Rate - it could well go to 10% or more

It may well mutate around the Vaccines

So if there is no room in the Hospitals the infected people may have to be put up in makeshift buildings - sports grounds or arenas or large halls

Or just stay at home and die.

Its looking more and more like 1918

well hopefully we won't reach anything like 1918 where people were dying terrible deaths the same day they got sick.  Hopefully a coronavirus can't mutate as deadly as the Flu virus did.  I am always worried about African strains because i am not sure we always hear whats going on there.  Fingers crossed this is the worst it gets with this one and hoping that when the big one comes, people listen for once!

“The single biggest threat to man's continued dominance on this planet is the virus,” the Nobel Prize-winning biologist Joshua Lederberg 

The virus will definitely keep on mutating -- it's what viruses do.

I can't get over the stupidity.  I would expect laymen to need some schooling on this and how viruses work, etc., but there is no need for legislators and administrators to be so clueless.  They are paid to know!

And medical people!  My mother had a visiting nurse come over a few weeks ago to do blood draws because my mother is on an anticoagulant.  Yes, she's wearing a mask.  But you can't social distance when you're doing blood draws.  And she's sitting on the opposite end of the (less than 6 ft. wide) couch from my mother, and they're talking.  Turns out they had gone to the same nursing school.  The nurse was here for approaching an hour and they were laughing and talking.  After she finally left I said to my mother, "What were you thinking?!"  And after she aired the house out with our draw fan, I said "Next time she comes, you've gotta keep it short!  She doesn't live here.  We don't know what she's been exposed to.  We have to treat her like she's Covid positive because as a nurse, she may very well be.  She can't be in here gabbing on about nursing school.  It sucks, I know it does, but we have to be safe."

So the nurse had to come again last week, and my mum told her, keep it short and sweet, come in, do your thing, and off you go, because of Covid.  And the nurse said, "But I've been vaccinated!"  And my mum said, "Nonetheless...". And when I got up and heard this story I said, " She had one shot.  No booster.  It was probably less than three weeks ago because of the slow roll-out, so immunity is not built up yet.  And does she not realize, the vaccine only protects her from getting really ill from Covid.  She can still spread it!".  Grrr!

ViQueen24 wrote: The virus will definitely keep on mutating -- it's what viruses do. I can't get over the stupidity.  I would expect laymen to need some schooling on this and how viruses work, etc., but there is no need for legislators and administrators to be so clueless.  They are paid to know! And medical people!  My mother had a visiting nurse come over a few weeks ago to do blood draws because my mother is on an anticoagulant.  Yes, she's wearing a mask.  But you can't social distance when you're doing blood draws.  And she's sitting on the opposite end of the (less than 6 ft. wide) couch from my mother, and they're talking.  Turns out they had gone to the same nursing school.  The nurse was here for approaching an hour and they were laughing and talking.  After she finally left I said to my mother, "What were you thinking?!"  And after she aired the house out with our draw fan, I said "Next time she comes, you've gotta keep it short!  She doesn't live here.  We don't know what she's been exposed to.  We have to treat her like she's Covid positive because as a nurse, she may very well be.  She can't be in here gabbing on about nursing school.  It sucks, I know it does, but we have to be safe." So the nurse had to come again last week, and my mum told her, keep it short and sweet, come in, do your thing, and off you go, because of Covid.  And the nurse said, "But I've been vaccinated!"  And my mum said, "Nonetheless...". And when I got up and heard this story I said, " She had one shot.  No booster.  It was probably less than three weeks ago because of the slow roll-out, so immunity is not built up yet.  And does she not realize, the vaccine only protects her from getting really ill from Covid.  She can still spread it!".  Grrr!

It is so disheartening to read stories like this - medical professionals should know better!  But there are so many of them that know less than we do about this... argh.