COVID cases increase and new variant
UK
ONS, 6 to 12 December 2020
England
Prevalence, 567,300
One in 95 people
London, East of England, East Midlands, South East
North West, Yorkshire, The Humber
Scotland
Up to 1 in 100
Wales
Up to 1 in 90
COVID-19 deaths
Decrease slightly for second week in a row
Deaths, + 2,756 in the week
Deaths remained above the five-year average in all English regions and in Wales
UK Official data
https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/detai...
CDC trends (Thursday, 10th December)
https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-trac...
Official US hospitalizations
https://gis.cdc.gov/grasp/COVIDNet/CO...
https://covidtracking.com
US
Hospitalizations, 117,777
Deaths, + 18,268 in the last 7 days
Week before, 17,291
Week before, 15,215
LA county
One in 80
Fresno County, CA
We had 9,572 new Covid-19 cases last week over seven days, an all time high for us.
The ICU beds in the county are full.
A new 50 bed ICU ward was opened today and there are plans to open overflow beds for Covid-19 patients in the convention center
We have been short staffed at my work related to staff members testing positive for Covid-19.
I find it very frustrating that people I know say this is not a real pandemic because only 1% of patients die.
Some people are getting very sick and the rest of us need to protect them by wearing masks, social distancing and avoid group situations.
Jeremy Luban, virologist, University of Massachusetts Medical School
It may very well be here.
It may have even started here.
The sequencing in the U.S. is so sporadic
It makes sense that it was detected first in the U.K. because they have probably the world’s best surveillance program.
Angela Rasmussen, virologist, Georgetown Center for Global Health Science and Security
It would not shock me at all to find out that it also is circulating in the U.S
the coronavirus already in the United States is spreading easily
a new variant will not change the need for people to follow public health guidance
I don’t think a travel ban is going to be particularly helpful
We already have out-of-control transmission of all the variants that are circulating in the U.S.
November, 30,000 direct passengers to US from LHR
Mutation / new variant, N501Y, B.1.1.7
Significance of 2020 12 was not clear until 8th December, by analysing epidemiological data in Kent
Sequencing takes 3 weeks and hundreds are needed for correlation studies
First identified 21st September
Increased viral load or increased viral shedding?
The country with the best genomic monitoring has the most mutations?
UK sequencing, 45% of global total of sequencing
Denmark has highest per capita sequence, and 10 cases 2020 12 have been picked up there
Australia has picked up 2 cases of 2020 12
There have been contemporaneous increases in incidence in several countries
Mutations occur at equal rate in every part of the world
South Africa mutation has similar effects as 2020 12 but arose separately
Nigeria (206 million) has a sharp increase in cases, despite poor levels of testing and no genomic sequencing
Possible children may be more suspectable to 2020 12
Any one infected person can be infected with a range of viral genomes
Likelihood of long COVID not likely to be caused by viral variant
Biology of linkage between genetic changes and viral behavioural change is poorly understood
R 0.8 up to 1.2
UK R today 1.2
Europe was R = 3 without controls
More likely to arise in immunocompromised patients
RNA Bases
A C U G
adenine, cytosine, uracil, and guanine
AAGCUGCUGUGUCCUCCUCUUGUUCGACGACACAGGRG
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science...
Virus, 29,903 base RNA code
Taiwan
Population 23 million
Not happy
Roll back foreign flights and tighten quarantine requirements for crew
Cargo pilot
NZ, said to already be coughing during his last flight, did not wear a mask at all times
First locally transmitted case since April
No community spread for 253 days
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