[Sankar]

Originally Posted by meerkat

Worth a read:

"Don’t bet on vaccine to protect us from Covid-19", says world health expert

That is good advice, though not good to hear. Take that as never put one's guard down. There are 70 vaccines under developent for SARSCOV2; 1 is in phase 2 trial in China and 2 of them are in Phase 1 trials in USA. The rest of the 67 nos are in pre-cilinical stage.

But neither SARS nor MERS, which pre-dates SARSCOV2, have a vaccine as on date those have undergone phase 1/2 trials too, so I do not have my hopes high for a SARS-COV2 vaccine either. If it happens well and good.

Not even mentioning other deadlier diseases like Ebola and Nipah and vaccines for them. Nipah has been known since 2 decades and Ebola is much older.

Originally Posted by V.Narayan

For the last 35 to 60 years the world of medicine has rapidly, and fortunately for us, moved to a situation where almost all communicable diseases have a cure.

Cure ≠Vaccine, both are completely different. A lot of Covid19 patients are cured of the disease without a vaccine.

[DigitalOne]

Originally Posted by Chetan_Rao

There will of course be need for prioritization like you mention, but please account for two things:

1. The end-to-end timeline will still be a few years, even with staggered vaccination.

True. At the same time it may not be required that the entire population is vaccinated. Once a certain population gets vaccinated the entire population gets a herd immunity.

Originally Posted by Chetan_Rao

2. The hot-zones will presumably expand in size and population volume between now and start of vaccination, so the groups within the staggered vaccination approach will become increasingly larger, the longer a vaccine takes to be available.

True. But on the other hand, the new infections are happening only in Hot zones. Even now in India half the districts are Covid-19 free. So hot zones may not increase in size, if containment is done well. Within the hot zone, the number of infections are high.

On the whole, I am fairly optimistic that if we have a new vaccine, with right prioritization, this disease can be defeated in a few months.

[msdivy]

Originally Posted by PGA

Why is it not impacting the entire human race in equal measure. Why countries in South Asia, SE Asia, Eastern Europe have been able avoid the disaster that is being inflicted on western Europe and USA. There are holes in every plausible explanation one might have in the case of Thailand, Malaysia, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, erstwhile Yugoslav region and even Mexico. South Africa and Australia are other examples of having manageable impact besides us.

The best medicine for far for Corona is social distancing, isolation of positive cases, quarantine of primary contacts, along with higher personal hygiene among all. Countries, states & their leaders who understood this early and were serious, took steps towards in containing corona are better placed in the fight against the epidemic. The countries who ridiculed the virus, felt they were immune and need not exercise caution are in a worse situation.

Case in point - Portugal has the epidemic in control, while their neighbor Spain is fighting a battle, even though there is no significant differentiating factor between the two except the language.

The impact on medical profession for the times to come confound me. At the cost of sounding a little exaggerated, if I was a doctor I would aproach each patient the way a bomb disposal guy handles potential explosive.

That is quite far-fetched. In couple of months, doctors will be out of PPE. Masks/gloves will remain. I feel in starting 2021, the situation will be like in 2019.

Originally Posted by V.Narayan

May be the West eats too much of processed foods. We won't know the answers for a while.

Originally Posted by carboy

Weather, I think. Hot weather.

I would say cleaner air in western countries . There is no basis for any of the above.

[carboy]

Originally Posted by msdivy

Case in point - Portugal has the epidemic in control, while their neighbor Spain is fighting a battle, even though there is no significant differentiating factor between the two except the language.

Portugal does mandatory BCG vaccine for everyone while Spain does not.

Originally Posted by msdivy

I would say cleaner air in western countries . There is no basis for any of the above.

Even yearly seasonal flu causes a lot of illness & deaths in US & many western countries every year. While it doesn't in tropical countries. US & many western countries have yearly vaccination against regular flu while we don't. So there is a basis for believing weather makes a difference.

[venkyhere]

While there are many 'theories' for explaining why the CoVid seems less speedy to spread and less lethal in tropical countries in the indian subcontinent and SE asia :
a) racial/genetic difference pertaining to immune system
b) BCG and malaria vaccination in childhood
c) hot weather
d) body and lungs used to more microbes and pollution that the 'developed' west, leading to battle-hardened immune/pulmonary system
e) use of immune boosting ingredients in food (even in poor households) - ginger, lemon, turmeric etc
f) red meat is consumed very less, and even then, very deeply cooked ; unlike the developed west where consumption is high and that too, very less in deeply cooked manner.
g) except for urban centers, processed/restaurant food still doesn't form a significant % of typical diet, unlike the west.

etc, etc,

the simplest explanation could be - it's a less lethal strain of virus prevalent in this geographical belt.

[carboy]

Originally Posted by venkyhere

f) red meat is consumed very less, and even then, very deeply cooked ; unlike the developed west where consumption is high and that too, very less in deeply cooked manner.

What does red meat have to do with the virus?

[alpha1]

Originally Posted by carboy

Even yearly seasonal flu causes a lot of illness & deaths in US & many western countries every year. While it doesn't in tropical countries. US & many western countries have yearly vaccination against regular flu while we don't. So there is a basis for believing weather makes a difference.

I think hot weather, dry air and lack of air conditioning helps drying of the body fluids left on common objects, thereby making the virus ineffective, and limiting the spread.

It is not just the sneeze or cough in your presence that gets you infected, touching common objects is another usual route of infection

[msdivy]

Originally Posted by carboy

Portugal does mandatory BCG vaccine for everyone while Spain does not.

The story of BCG is most countries had it mandatory at some point in time. In many western countries, after eliminating the TB, they have made its use case-by-case basis. So the elderly & middle-aged population had BCG vaccination. But the younger population isn't.

(Affected implies cases crossing 40K)
Countries affected by corona with BCG mandatory even now: Iran, Turkey, China, Russia, Brazil
Countries affected by corona with BCG mandatory earlier: Spain, France, Germany, UK
Countries affected by corona with BCG never mandatory: USA, Italy

(Less than 15K cases)
Countries not affected by corona with BCG not mandatory: Austria, Sweden, Israel, South Korea
I have left small countries like Singapore.

So there is no correlation between corona & BCG. And neither proved by limited testing done so far.

Even yearly seasonal flu causes a lot of illness & deaths in US & many western countries every year. While it doesn't in tropical countries. US & many western countries have yearly vaccination against regular flu while we don't. So there is a basis for believing weather makes a difference.

Flu shots are taken as prevention, whether the climate is cold or warm. In most countries, it is recommended but not mandatory. Flu shots help in reducing the use of antibiotics.

Originally Posted by venkyhere

the simplest explanation could be - it's a less lethal strain of virus prevalent in this geographical belt.

South Asia has less air travel compared to Europe, USA and that controlled the entry of epidemic at multiple places. Most of South Asia, including India, are under either full or partial lockdown & the epidemic is contained so far. We have the see the result after the lockdown is lifted.

Originally Posted by carboy

You need to normalize the number of cases by dividing it with population.

Yes, normalizing will make it accurate. Small countries have a large number of cases, even with BCG vaccination & that the point I wanted to highlight

[carboy]

Originally Posted by msdivy

(Affected implies cases crossing 40K)
(Less than 15K cases)

You need to normalize the number of cases by dividing it with population. Also better measure would be no of deaths divided by population rather than number of cases. No of cases has a huge dependency on how seriously the country is testing. As seen in several reports. 80% of people don't even know they have been infected - the virus does practically nothing to them after infecting them.

Originally Posted by msdivy

Flu shots are taken as prevention, whether the climate is cold or warm. In most countries, it is recommended but not mandatory.

But the number of people who take flu vaccinations in cold countries is very large as compared to the people in warmer countries. In the US, for e.g. every year before flu season, vaccination camps are arranged all over the place - in public libraries, in schools, in offices, etc. You don't see that happening in warmer countries. The simple reason is that warmer countries don't need to. Hence there is no culture of flu vaccinations in warmer countries.

[luvDriving]

Can coronavirus spread by way of water ? I heard some news item in passing last night about such an event occurring somewhere in Europe.

I remembered it just now and did some searching (googling) and found this news item.

https://www.connexionfrance.com/Fren...e-water-source

The article says that the traces found cannot transmit in water but WHO says no evidence for it yet so they have not ruled it out. I shudder to even think if this happens here in India. There was some news a few days ago about our government mulling testing sewage but it was not repeated.

[rohitoasis]

Hi, i have been frequenting this Government of Kerala Dashboard.

In case somebody in this forum knows someone who works on this, please do help highlight an error in numbers that has crept up today. In the chart for the number of quarantine cases, The data for Trivandrum, Kollam and Pathanamthitta is showing data as on 29th March 2020 instead of yesterdays data. I was surprised for a few seconds today morning when i saw. If somebody here knows someone working behind this, please do help get this corrected.

[Thad E Ginathom]

Originally Posted by carboy

2) Linear scale is better to show absolute numbers while logarithmic gives a picture showing rate of growth which is what I was looking for. Rate of growth looks similar in different states except Kerala.

Thanks.

I am an innumerate dunce that was actually thrown out of the maths class! I got a friend to explain your point to me in very simple terms, and can now see and accept what you mean.

[mvadg]

Originally Posted by luvDriving

Can coronavirus spread by way of water ?

[ PS - I am not a doctor. ] By "non-potable" they probably mean sewage. I did not want to post this before scientists agreed among themselves, but it is a known fact that other viruses spread via the oral fecal route. I am not sure if the following is a peer reviewed study, but here it is:

Conclusions Gastrointestinal symptoms are common in patients with COVID‐19, and had an increased prevalence in the later stage of the recent epidemic in China. SARS‐CoV‐2 enters gastrointestinal epithelial cells, and the faeces of COVID‐19 patients are potentially infectious.

Review article: gastrointestinal features in COVID‐19 and the possibility of faecal transmission

EDIT: It is a peer reviewed article.

[Gansan]

Originally Posted by msdivy

The story of BCG is most countries had it mandatory at some point in time. In many western countries, after eliminating the TB, they have made its use case-by-case basis. So the elderly & middle-aged population had BCG vaccination. But the younger population isn't.

What explains the difference in Covid 19 numbers (both infections and mortality) between Spain and Portugal? I think they are almost a single country, more or less. I read Portugal has universal BCG and Spain doesn't.

[civic-sense]

Originally Posted by Gansan

What explains the difference in Covid 19 numbers (both infections and mortality) between Spain and Portugal? I think they are almost a single country, more or less. I read Portugal has universal BCG and Spain doesn't.

One, Spain has a population about 5 times of Portugal.

Two, this:

On 19 February, 2,500 Valencia soccer fans mixed with 40,000 Atalanta supporters from Bergamo in Italy for a Champions League game in Milan which Giorgio Gori, mayor of Bergamo, has described as “the bomb” which exploded the virus in Lombardy.

In Spain, Valencia players, fans and sports journalists were among the first to fall ill.

Source: https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...ponse-analysis