We are tired of COVID.But important questions still need answers

Just as it’s hard to say something new about the weather, it’s hard to say something new about the pandemic. We can talk about changing circumstances and how it affects your day, but for most people it is only part of life on earth so far. ..Several People value umbrellas Or sunscreen. Some people don’t care, others don’t care if they or others get sunburned or wet.

And hopefully when the sixth wave of Ontario reaches its peak, Wastewater signal is still jumping Even if hospitalization stabilizes after a holiday weekend, it is a revelatory moment and an uncertain moment. It’s amazing that many have decided that a pandemic is what happens to others, and in a sense many are right. The atomization of collective responsibility that snaps back to ignoring the vulnerable parts of society is basically a return to normal pre-pandemic life.

This moment is uncertain because the pandemic isn’t over.This wave isn’t over yet, and the hospital system Quietly deteriorating Due to staff loss and volume. The hospital will be the last place this is over. And there’s still a lot we don’t know.

Start with the variant. At BA.2 (here and elsewhere) and BA.4 and 5 (South Africa and elsewhere), they are still unwound with omicron branches of the tree, and it seems very good. In avoiding Omicron immunity after unvaccinated infection.. ) South Africa is at the beginning of a new wave that could be a precursor One version of the future: A penal wave that repeats every 6 months, each infected with a new version of COVID as the immune system weakens.

And more variants are coming. We have no idea what they do exactly.

Dr. Angela Rasmussen, a virologist at the University of Saskatchewan’s Vaccines and Infectious Diseases Organization (Saskatoon), said: “We think we are completely uncertain about what their importance will be from a public health perspective.”

Variant of concern surpasses other strains. Variant of concern is transmitted in the measles region as it has been seen so far. Rasmussen explains that if the virus replicates so quickly, it doesn’t matter how sick you are. What happens to a host before it infects a new host is not a virus issue.

“There was this lasting myth that viruses have always evolved to be less pathogenic, but that’s just not true,” says Rasmussen. In highly vaccinated populations such as Canada, she said that selective pressure against the virus could include evasion of vaccines, post-infection immunity, and even T-cell immunity, which is also severe. Point out that it can make a difference. She points to a study of the viral nucleocapsid protein, which is a severity control in animal models, led by Dr. Vineet Menachery of the University of Texas School of Medicine in Galveston.

“Therefore, mutations can occur outside the spikes (the proteins that make up the majority of the mutations), and we don’t know what the functional consequences will be,” Rasmussen says. “This can increase the infectivity, infectivity, and pathogenicity of the virus, and it’s really scary to think about it.”

Omicron’s incredible luck (initially thought to be about a quarter less severe than Delta, but eventually reduced the chances of sending people to the hospital by nearly 50-70%. ), We may be lucky again. We may not.

That leads to other questions. It remains to be seen how long it will take for triple-dose vaccine protection against serious consequences to decline, or how Ontario and Canada will promote better triple-dose coverage everywhere. Models from the University of Toronto earlier this week Unvaccinated is dangerous for vaccinated people Anecdotally observed by healthcare professionals. For example, older relatives whose protection is weakened by two doses, or young unvaccinated families.The vulnerability is Seen in AmericaAs the Washington Post wrote, in California and Mississippi, “three-quarters of vaccinated older people who died in January and February did not have booster immunity.”

“This is a three-dose vaccine,” says Dr. Peter Jüni, an extroverted science director at the Independent Volunteer Science Table in Ontario. “The fourth dose is the first true boost, but the question is how long does it take for the effectiveness of the third dose to actually begin to decline to a reasonable degree?”

Beyond that, there is an impact we are just beginning to grasp.I don’t know how popular it is Long COVID Especially after Omicron, or how useful one, two or three doses are. I have a ridiculously healthy and healthy friend who caught Omicron in January, just before his third dose. He has been experiencing headaches, brain fog and lack of energy for four months. In an era of near-intentional outbreaks, it’s a lottery.

“We estimate that about 45-55% of Ontario’s population is infected with Omicron,” says Juni. The numbers are very large. “

Then there is a habit.Recently, as irreplaceable Ed Young Written for the Atlantic OceanClimate change drives animals to different habitats, increasing the risk of virus spread among strange species. We live in a pandemic — an era when pandemics are becoming more common. So we need to take steps we should take, such as normalizing masking where high-risk people have to go, improving ventilation, strengthening vaccination incentives, and adapting to life with the virus. I have.

So now it’s possible that the sixth wave of Ontario has reached its peak and the weather is improving. It still carries a heavy burden of suffering, but many societies seem to accept it. Ontario may be able to ignore the weather for some time, even without COVID. As Rasmussen said, she laughs halfway, “I just want to go back to the study of Ebola. I miss Ebola.” She can’t go back to that yet.

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