New South African variant.

[JimSh]

Its a deep rabbit hole, but here's a good start.

Number 3 Amazon best seller, only recently been deposed from number 1 slot.

https://www.amazon.com/Real-Anthony-Fauci-Democracy-Childrens/dp/1510766804/ref=zg_bs_books_3/140-2263647-5033657?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=503CNQHZDRX80XXNN1YT

I don't think I'll go down that rabbit hole thank you.
There are too many of them on this side of the Atlantic already

[culzean]

Here we go again.
Covid news – live: ‘Work from home plans drawn up’ as UK could see 90,000 cases a day by Christmas
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/covid-omicron-cases-vaccine-boosters-live-b1971766.html

"Ministers are expected to sign off new rules to impose home working and vaccine certification across England in the face of rising Covid cases, the Guardian understands.
Downing Street said no final decisions had been made but ministers and officials convened on Wednesday to move to plan B and to begin imposing some restrictions as early as Wednesday night."
https://pressnewsagency.org/ministers-expected-to-sign-off-plan-b-covid-rules-for-england/

Too little too late again.
Why did he not re -introduce working from home and extra mask wearing last month when he was warned by scientists?

The panic merchants are at it again,  Countries who have more experience of the Omicron virus than us say it is nothing to worry about, in fact it is better if the population is exposed to the milder variant because it will effectively 'vaccinate' those who do not want a dodgy man made vaccine.... Many in SA did not even know that had Omicron, they went into hospital for something else and due to the practice of testing everyone who enters a hospital in SA for covid they were told 'you have Omicron covid' - better to let a harmless variant like Omicron spread and push the other more virulent strains out than to carry on with all the malarkey we have had up to now.

[JimSh]

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/covid-omicron-cases-vaccine-boosters-live-b1971766.html?page=2

Or will the PM delay again in light of Schrodinger's party?

Allegra Stratton has just resigned (or been pushed)
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/dec/08/allegra-stratton-leaves-cop26-role-after-no-10-christmas-party-video

Cummings suggests Plan B is a dead cat to distract from party allegations but is it the other way round?
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/boris-plan-b-christmas-cummings-b1971962.html

It's just one farce following another.

[richardfrost]

better to let a harmless variant like Omicron spread and push the other more virulent strains out than to carry on with all the malarkey we have had up to now.

Thanks Dr Culzean.

[JimSh]

Yep. The government could save a fortune by sacking all those so-called scientists and hiring an optimistic expert like Professor Culzean.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m0012b15/the-richard-dimbleby-lecture-dame-sarah-gilbert

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/sage-97-minutes-coronavirus-covid-19-response-29-november-2021 (pdf)

Excerpt
"6. The manner in which Omicron has spread in parts of South Africa while Delta levels
remain low suggests that it could have any combination of greater transmissibility,
escape from natural immunity and escape from vaccine-induced immunity.
7. It is highly likely that Omicron can escape immunity to some extent, but it is not yet clear
how much. The evidence comes from the number of reinfections already seen, and from
the presence in the Omicron genome of a combination of mutations that are either
already known to be associated with immune escape or which are found in areas that
structural studies suggest will affect antibody binding. All known antigenic sites for
neutralising antibodies are potentially disrupted, which has not been seen in
combination in any previous variant. Some mutations may affect some T cell epitopes in
the spike protein, S, although at a population level this is less likely to have a major
impact because different individuals recognize different epitopes. Other changes are
present that may affect transmissibility, for example those associated with ACE2 binding
site, or furin cleavage sites or in regions outside of S such as in nucleoprotein, N."

No I don't really know what it all means either but I would rather the government introduce more precautions just now(or even better - had done so weeks ago) till the guys who do understand find out, rather than open the floodgates just now and risk a full lockdown early in the new year.

[JimSh]

Boris on tv at 6 ( or sometime after)
but whether he'll talk about Covid, Christmas parties, Kermit the Frog or Peppa Pig is anybody's guess

[nowster]

Let's translate:

All known antigenic sites for neutralising antibodies are potentially disrupted, which has not been seen in combination in any previous variant.

The surface details that antibodies latch on to appear to have changed. This is new.

Some mutations may affect some T cell epitopes in the spike protein, S, although at a population level this is less likely to have a major impact because different individuals recognize different epitopes.

The "spike" which attaches to a cell to infect it has changed too. This will affect the effectiveness of a different facet of the immune system. Different people's immune systems will have learned to recognise different parts of this, so whether this bit of the immune response works will be a little hit-and-miss.

I can recommend watching:

[JimSh]

Let's paraphrase,
Best left to those with qualifications and experience in immunology, epidemiology and virology (and hope that governments will act sensibly on their advice.)
I have faith in the former but not the latter.

[JimSh]

Latest Sage minutes from 7th December

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/sage-98-minutes-coronavirus-covid-19-response-7-december-2021/sage-98-minutes-coronavirus-covid-19-response-7-december-2021   

I was looking for these yesterday but they weren't available then.
Some sobering reading and pointed recommendations.

"16. Given the rapid increase, decision makers will need to consider urgently which measures to introduce to slow the growth of infections if the aim is to reduce the likelihood of unsustainable pressure on the NHS. The effectiveness of these will be dependent on the measures chosen, and also on behavioural responses. Evidence suggests that measures could be reintroduced with expectation of a similar level of adherence as has been seen in the past. Adherence is likely to be higher if messaging and policy have clear rationales and are consistent. Consistency across the UK may help with messaging."

[madasafish]

I ran the sums:

If  Omicron Covid cases double every two days, then by 1st week in January we will see 1million cases in total. With the daily rate of new infections running at 0.25 to 0.5million a day.

With what effect on hospital numbers or deaths I have no idea as there are  zero stats available.

[culzean]

The UK government are certainly not following the science any more, not quite sure what they are following.. maybe Boris just wants scary headlines to 'bury' the Downing Street party news..

In stark contrast to Astrazenica it is sad to see that Pfizer and Moderna will not share the formula of their vaccine with WHO to allow it to be made available more cheaply to countries around the world... The is a huge patent battle brewing in USA,  where the NIH ( national institute of Health - a public body ) say that the mRNA vaccine was developed in a collaboration with Moderna using public money, but the that the NIH did not appear on any of the patents... So it is Pfizer vs US government ( as has happened in the past because Pfizer broke the rules and got heavily fined, in fact Pfizer has the unenviable reputation of being the most heavily fined Pharma company in the world because of malpractice ).

The WHO has seen no recorded deaths due to Omicron from the 38 countries that have declared they have the variant, and in some of them the variant has been around for over 4 weeks.

The WHO has called the UK's response to Omicron 'extreme',   Japan dropped plans to stop flights from South Africa the day after they introduced them.

https://www.cityam.com/anxiously-optimistic-south-africa-holds-its-breath-as-battle-of-the-covid-mutations-rages-omicron-deaths-still-zero-despite-new-coronavirus-variant-spreading-twice-as-fast-as-deadly-delta/

[Kremmen]

If Omicron isn't as bad as previous variants then that is good news.

Pfizer and Moderna should be thoroughly ashamed of their secretive profiteering holding the world to ransom.

[JimSh]

I ran the sums:

If  Omicron Covid cases double every two days, then by 1st week in January we will see 1million cases in total. With the daily rate of new infections running at 0.25 to 0.5million a day.

With what effect on hospital numbers or deaths I have no idea as there are  zero stats available.

I don't think it will be as bad as that. Doubling time is likely to be quite a bit longer than two days when things settle down.
Some of the cases are being found rather than as a result of spreading from known infections.
Numbers are still relatively small so difficult to get an accurate estimate for doubling time.
South Africa's doubling time is running at about a week at present.
UK has greater percentage vaccinated than S Africa therefore less of the population susceptible to infection.
There will be even less susceptible people as vaccinated population increases and infected people are isolated or acquire immunity through infection.
 However it comes at a very bad time with social gatherings for Christmas and other religious (and Pagan) festivals around the New Year.
Also depends on how well people adhere to restrictions. If symptoms are not very serious many people will be tempted to socialise or work (many through financial necessity) despite having symptoms. Mixed messaging from government will not help.
If doubling time continues at anything like current rates,however, the NHS will be put under serious pressure before long.

[culzean]

UK has greater percentage vaccinated than S Africa therefore less of the population susceptible to infection.

The accountant chappies at Pfizer are telling us that previous / present vaccines do not work against Omicron and that governments need to buy even more of their overpriced stuff.  Those Pfizer bean counters would love to see everyone getting a jab every 2 weeks.   If there are less people vaccinated in SA ( about 26% have been jabbed )  then it is even more re-assuring that no deaths reported from Omicron yet after over 4 weeks.

[ColinB]

The accountant chappies at Pfizer are telling us that previous / present vaccines do not work against Omicron ...

Wherever did you get that scaremongering from? Last news i saw about Pfizer was trumpeting that their vaccine was actually pretty good against omicron, for example:
https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/biontech-pfizer-say-test-shows-3-doses-vaccine-neutralise-omicron-2021-12-08/