Why is Covid-22 trending on Twitter? Here are the misconceptions about the variants of the coronavirus

There is a Catch-22. There is also the song “22” by Taylor Swift. But what is “Covid-22” and why the hell is it trending on Twitter?

As you may know, Covid-19 is the abbreviation for Coronavirus Disease 2019, a disease caused by Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). There is the ’19’ at the end not because there have been 18 other Covids as Ted Nugent may have thought, which I covered previously for Forbes. Nor is it because the virus is now 19 years old and old enough to legally drink in Canada and gamble in Alabama and Nebraska. No, the 19th was there because SARS-CoV-2 was first detected in December 2019.

But there was no Covid-20 or Covid-21 because all of the variants that emerged during the ongoing pandemic came from the same lineage or “family” as the original SARS-CoV-2. Alpha, beta, delta, gamma, lambda and other disturbing and interesting variants listed on the World Health Organization (WHO) website are all the result of progressive mutations in genetic material. of the original SARS-CoV-2. In other words, all of these variations are from the initial version which has started to spread. For such variations, the answer to the question “who is your daddy?” Would be the Covid-19 coronavirus.

But now the word ‘Covid-22’ is all the rage on Twitter, as the following tweet pointed out:

In fact, as of Monday afternoon, there were over 58,000 tweets with this term:

This seems to have left quite a few people rather confused:

So, is “Covid-22” a new official term from the WHO or the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) or some other scientific organization? Is “Covid-22” still real?

Well, it looks like that term “Covid-22” stems from what Sai Reddy, PhD, associate professor of systems and synthetic immunology at ETH Zurich in Switzerland, was able to say. According to Vanessa Chalmers writing for The sun, Reddy warned that a new variant could emerge in 2022 that could pose a “big risk.” The emphasis here is on the words “could” and “could” because it’s not yet 2022, unless Reddy has a time machine.

He would have referred to this possibility like “Covid-22” saying, “Covid-22 could be worse than what we are seeing now. Apparently he used the term “Covid-21” when referring to the Delta variant when speaking to a German publication called seen.

OK, first of all, the Delta variant was initially detected in October 2020 in India, not in 2021. So any term “21” wouldn’t quite work, unless it was a sort of new blackjack hand.

Second, the Delta variant is a variant of the original SARS-CoV-2 that can cause Covid-19. It is still a Covid-19 coronavirus. So no one should use the term “Covid-21” to describe the Delta variant. It would be like preparing a baby shower gift for your best friend from college that says, “Congratulations on your impending baby rhino.” This assumes, of course, that your best friend from college isn’t a rhino and that you meant something else when you said he or she was horny. If you really want to use numbers to describe the Delta variant, you can call it the B.1.617.2 variant, which is its Pango lineage designation.

Third, there is no Covid-22 at this time. Look at your smartphone. We’re currently in 2021. Facebook hasn’t yet tracked what you’ll be doing in 2022. When it comes to variants, the biggest concerns right now are the Delta and Delta plus variants which are more contagious than the original version of the. virus. They have spread to different parts of the world, including the United States.

Then there is the Lambda variant, which is technically a “variant of interest” and not a “variant of concern” based on the current WHO classification. It has spread to different parts of South America and has already reached more than 30 countries.

The Pfizer / BioNTech (or sorry, the Comirnaty), Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccines still appear to offer decent protection against these circulating variants. However, there are concerns that these vaccines may not be as effective against the Delta or Lambda variants compared to their efficacy against the original version or the alpha variant. However, further studies are needed to better determine how effective they may be.

Many public health experts have designated 2022 as the year the pandemic ends. This would be in line with what happened in 1918 with the influenza pandemic, which spanned three years. It started with a “hereditary wave” in the spring of 1918. Then influenza activity declined in the summer of 1918 before increasing even more from the fall of 1918 to the winter of 1918-1919. Influenza activity fell again in the summer of 1919 before picking up again in the following fall and winter before the pandemic finally ended after this third wave in 1920. A similar development could occur for this Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic in the United States as and when. enough time for enough people to develop immunity through a combination of Covid-19 vaccination and natural exposure and recovery from infections.

Could even more contagious variants emerge next year in 2022? It is certainly a possibility. As long as the virus continues to reproduce and spread, new and worse variants can result. Whenever the virus reproduces itself in a person’s cells, it can make mistakes, like a drunk person photocopying their buttocks. Some of these errors (which are essentially mutations in the genetic codes of the resulting viruses) can weaken the virus. Others may make little difference. And some can make the virus stronger. As long as the structures of the spike proteins on the virus don’t change too much, vaccine protection has a good chance of preventing the pandemic from continuing beyond 2022, at least in the United States.

One of the biggest concerns with Variants is that a so-called “escape variant” may emerge. It is said to be a version of the virus so different from the original versions that it is able to escape or evade the protection offered by vaccines and natural immunity. It would be like if your friend is having so much plastic surgery that you don’t recognize them anymore. You can say, “Hey, nobody still looks surprised, have you seen my friend?” Likewise, the virus must be so different that your immune system may not be able to properly detect the virus when it enters your body or generate an effective response to the virus.

Keep in mind that changes in the virus tend to happen gradually. It’s not like a new variant suddenly pops up someday, having arms and legs instead of spikes and able to climb walls like Spider Man. Instead, the configuration of the spike protein can change more and more with each generation of new variants. If public health surveillance systems are able to keep up with the evolution of different versions of SARS-CoV-2, scientists may be able to anticipate when versions of the virus have changed enough to merit the production of new vaccines that correspond better to the new variants.

The mRNA technology used by Pfizer / BioNTech and Moderna and the adenovirus platforms used by Astra-Zeneca and Johnson & Johnson are expected to facilitate the exchange of different updated versions of the cutting edge protein. Having such vaccine technology is a game-changer. So it’s not as if the virus is going to catch much of the world with its pants down like it did in 2020.

During this pandemic, it’s important to stay balanced and not let concerns go too far both ways. Some continue to try to minimize the pandemic, claim it is not serious and thus avoid precautions. While, on the other hand, some are a bit too apocalyptic about the pandemic, believing it could go on forever and fearing the world could never recover from it. Neither extreme is the right way to go.

Instead, for now, the key is to maintain an appropriate perspective and follow science-based strategies. You don’t have to hide in your toilet paper teepee all the time. However, maintain Covid-19 precautions such as social distancing and the use of a face mask when interacting with other people in public until vaccination rates reach levels high enough to meet thresholds. immunity and interrupt transmission of the virus. The longer it takes to cross these thresholds and the more the virus reproduces and spreads in the meantime, the more new variants can appear.

Also try to stick to the terms set by the World Health Organization (WHO). They were careful to choose the appropriate terms to describe various aspects of the pandemic. They urged not to use country or cultural names for the virus, as such names can be exploited to promote racism and hatred against people of certain racial or ethnic backgrounds. (Remember the term “kung-flu” virus?) And they used a naming convention to help everyone understand how different versions of the virus emerged. Once you start using new and unofficial terms like “Covid-20”, “Covid-21” or “Covid-22” you can cause confusion or even panic. Or the reverse can happen. People can stop taking the pandemic seriously because you seem to be trying to cause more panic than necessary.

Rather than speculating on what might happen in the future, it is better to focus on managing the variants that are of concern today by increasing vaccination rates and maintaining other Covid-19 precautions at the same time. time. Our society may have 99 issues right now, but Covid-22 isn’t.