The World Health Organization provided a status report about COVID virus variants and vaccines we wanted to share. That’s particularly because of recent events in India that may be due to the ‘UK’ and ‘Indian’ types. The truth of the matter is all viruses evolve over time into new mutations. But, they can only do this when they spread to a new host which we, of course can help prevent.
Virus Variants and Their Risks Are a ‘Lucky Dip’
Coronaviruses are not vicious creatures hell-bent on destroying humanity. Viruses are chemical compounds scientists describe as ‘organisms at the edge of life’. They evolve by autonomous natural selection, and they reproduce by creating multiple copies of themselves through self-assembly. While they mutate at random, they may very rarely assume a more dangerous form.
The most important thing to take on board about COVID virus variants therefore is life is a ‘lucky dip’. And we can stack the odds against ourselves by allowing an uncontrolled surge as is happening in India. That’s why scientists are concerned a new rogue virus may be running wild. A coronavirus variant of concern that’s able to find a way through our natural and vaccine immunity.
About Vaccine Efficacy and COVID Virus Variants
The World Health Organization is forthright about this. The vaccines currently in circulation were developed to tackle the original coronavirus. However, we can expect them ‘to provide at least some protection against new virus variants,’ they say. That’s because those vaccines elicit ‘a broad immune response involving a range of antibodies and cells’.
Wrapping things up, there are two things we need to do now. The first is to continue social distancing, face masking, and sanitizing to slow the spread and throttle the mutation rate. And the second is likewise. Continue social distancing, face masking, and sanitizing after we vaccinate, because we can’t yet be sure how solid our protection will be.
Related
The Variant Sweeping India What We Know
India’s COVID-19 Surge – What Went Wrong?
Preview Image: Schematic of Coronavirus
