Socratic Monologue

They were investigating the role of the spike protein mutations in the ability of Covid variants to evade immune response so that we can design more effective vaccines and better understand the inevitable future mutations. So, they were engaging in scientific research in order to plan ahead for future expected disease developments, and likely to gain deeper understanding of the workings of viruses generally.

Here's the paper:

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1....512134v1.full

Abstract:"The recently identified, globally predominant SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant (BA.1) is highly transmissible, even in fully vaccinated individuals, and causes attenuated disease compared with other major viral variants recognized to date1–7. The Omicron spike (S) protein, with an unusually large number of mutations, is considered the major driver of these phenotypes3,8. We generated chimeric recombinant SARS-CoV-2 encoding the S gene of Omicron in the backbone of an ancestral SARS-CoV-2 isolate and compared this virus with the naturally circulating Omicron variant. The Omicron S-bearing virus robustly escapes vaccine-induced humoral immunity, mainly due to mutations in the receptor-binding motif (RBM), yet unlike naturally occurring Omicron, efficiently replicates in cell lines and primary-like distal lung cells. In K18-hACE2 mice, while Omicron causes mild, non-fatal infection, the Omicron S-carrying virus inflicts severe disease with a mortality rate of 80%. This indicates that while the vaccine escape of Omicron is defined by mutations in S, major determinants of viral pathogenicity reside outside of S."

What the sensationalized media reports minimize or don't mention at all is that the original Covid19 strain was shown to be 100% fatal to mice in similar tests -- so this version is actually less virulent. Interestingly, the reports that seem ashamed of this fact seem to be...uh...on one side of the political fence mostly.

Someone who understands how people tend to respond to percentages and probabilities can be a very effective deceiver. That's why the news reports don't say "this new strain is 20% less virulent than the original strain", even though this is more suitable for a news article since it contains more information than the "80%" claim; it contains two facts in one simple to comprehend passage. The problem with the "20%" locution is that it isn't scary.

As an interesting aside, the original news ("news") report that blew this up (link to Daily Mail) wouldn't display at all on my very secure Firefox browser; I had to use an out of date version of Safari with no tracker blockers installed to view it.

Don't believe everything you read out there, folks. There are a lot of reasons for a lot of people to scare you into believing things that simply aren't true.