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edschweppeWell, this is just ... wonderful. It looks like the latest COVID-19 subvariants will lead to "substantial infections" this summer:
Sigh. The good news is that apparently the current vaccines are still really, really good at keeping one from dying from acute COVID. But they're less and less effective at keeping one from getting infected in the first place, and there's no news yet about what impact these subvariants are having on the odds of getting long COVID.
And, of course, even with way over a thousand cases a day here in Massachusetts, almost nobody is bothering to wear masks indoors anymore.
Sigh.
Until last week, Dr. Ali Mokdad expected the United States to have "a very good summer" in terms of COVID-19. Projections by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, where he works, forecasted falling cases, hospitalizations, and deaths through at least September.
Then, circumstances changed: Researchers discovered that BA.4 and BA.5 — subvariants of Omicron spreading in the United States — are "immune escapes," adept at avoiding the antibodies the body produces after vaccination or infection to neutralize the virus.
"That has changed our view for what will happen this summer," Mokdad said. Though he still expects cases to decrease, the decline will be slower and smaller than projected.
Dr. Dan Barouch, director of the Center for Virology and Vaccine Research at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, said he anticipates the subvariants will spawn a summer of "substantial infections," but low rates of hospitalization and death.
As of the week ending June 18, BA.4 and BA.5 accounted for about 35 percent of cases in the United States, according to estimates by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — figures that experts say should rise in the weeks to come.
"I expect that BA.5 will likely become the dominant virus in the United States this summer," Barouch said.
Barouch published a study in the New England Journal of Medicine on Wednesday that found that BA.4 and BA.5 are far better at avoiding antibodies than any prior strains — three times better than BA.1 and BA.2, and 20 times better than the "original" COVID-19.
"What we're seeing with each subsequent variant is iteratively higher levels of transmissibility and higher levels of antibody immune escape," he said. As a result, "we're seeing high levels of infection in populations that are highly vaccinated, as well as populations that have a high level of natural immunity to the prior variants."
COVID vaccines work by prompting the body to produce an immune response, including antibodies, to fight the virus. As the subvariants start to avoid those antibodies, vaccination affords less and less protection against infection.
However, experts emphasize that vaccines remain very effective at preventing severe cases of COVID-19.
"If people have vaccine immunity or natural immunity, then they have substantial protection against severe disease," Barouch said.
Omicron and its subvariants also tend to be less severe than variants like Delta, said Mokdad, who estimates 80 percent of infections with Omicron are actually asymptomatic.
As for the summer, Barouch said he "can't rule out that there will be a surge," like there was last summer.
Mokdad said there is "a remote possibility" of a third wave over the summer. But he expects cases to start rising again around the start of October, both because of changing seasons and waning immunity.
Dr. Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, said it's impossible to predict the course of COVID-19.
"Anybody that models this more than a couple of weeks out is basically just using pixie dust," he said. "There is no pattern whatsoever developing from a seasonality standpoint. It's all being driven by the variants."
For Osterholm, variants and subvariants are a "complete wild card" in the epidemiological equation.
"We just have to be humble and acknowledge, we don't know," he said.
Sigh. The good news is that apparently the current vaccines are still really, really good at keeping one from dying from acute COVID. But they're less and less effective at keeping one from getting infected in the first place, and there's no news yet about what impact these subvariants are having on the odds of getting long COVID.
And, of course, even with way over a thousand cases a day here in Massachusetts, almost nobody is bothering to wear masks indoors anymore.
Sigh.
(no subject)
Date: 2022-06-27 02:35 pm (UTC)