New variant of coronavirus could infect humans again
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The standard waves of the disease from year to year approach us from America. Thanks to a sick American, we can predict what our fall and winter will be like. So far, a wave of covid is rising in the US. Over the past week, the number of cases has increased by 14%. At the same time, hospitalizations are 6 times less compared to the summer of last year. And the number of deaths is getting smaller, but it still is.
As doctor Alexander Solovyov, a leading expert of the National Medical Association for the development of expert activities in the field of laboratory diagnostics “MedLabExpert”, writes on his tg channel, the worsening of the epidemiological situation is now associated with various variants of the virus: EG.5.1 (Eris), FL.1.5 (Kraken), XBB.1.16.6 (Arcturus)”. Now the number of infected in the United States is estimated at 600 thousand people.
– The new version of EG.5 (Eris) contains many new mutations, – explains the doctor. – Separate mutations allow this virus variant to avoid neutralization by antibodies even after infection with XBB variants. At the same time, the virus increased its ability to bind to the ACE2 receptor.”
What it means: This subvariant is even more resistant to our immunity, it can re-infect people who have already been sick. According to Alexander Solovyov, according to recent data, a second infection is 1.06 times more likely to lead to serious illness. And almost 6% of those who get reinfected die if the first case of COVID-19 was severe.
WHAT ARE THE SYMPTOMS?
The symptoms of EG.5 infection differ little from those of omicron:
* Sore throat, hoarseness.
* Runny nose, nasal congestion, sneezing.
* Cough
* Headache and muscle pain.
* Altered sense of smell
Some who have already been sick say that “the physical symptoms are worse than the previous time, the fog in the head is very pronounced.”
“By analogy with Omicron, a new version of the virus can cause deterioration in 2 months from the discovery of the first genomes, in October-November,” Alexander Soloviev believes.
THE FLU IS NOT YET NOTICED, AND COVID IS INCREASING THE RATE
Data collected from US emergency departments suggests that COVID-19 levels were highest in recent weeks among people 75 and older, similar to what was seen during the peak last winter. The number of emergency room visits for children ages 0-11 has also increased significantly.
According to the US National Center for Health Statistics, COVID-19 continues to kill many more people at any time of the year. For example, for the last three weeks, the numbers are:
* At week 29, 14 people died from influenza, 445 from covid.
* At week 30, 8 people died from influenza, 378 from covid.
* At 31 weeks, 12 people died from influenza, 262 from covid.
At the same time, overall, mortality is significantly lower than in previous years. WHO experts attribute this to vaccination. Despite the ability of the virus to escape immunity, after vaccination, the disease does not progress in such severe forms.
BY THE WAY
Among animals, mink are most often infected with covid
Scientists count the number of animals infected with covid. Of course, not all of them fall into their field of vision, but still it is obvious that minks get sick most often (more than 1300 registered cases).
They are followed by deer, cats, dogs and mice. The top ten also include lions, tigers, and hamsters. Most of the time sick animals were registered in the US, Denmark and the Netherlands (maybe they are simply better controlled there?). Note that bats, which are in fact credited with starting the pandemic, only rank 11th (also only 11 detected cases).
So the virus does not spare not only people …
