As long as the graph slopes up at all, the rate of growth is increasing. It’s a graph of the number per day, which IS the rate of growth. Plus it’s a log scale, on her graphs, which makes any slowdown look faster than it is. They might show that the rate of growth of the rate of growth is slowing, but the rate of growth itself is still increasing. It’s hard to tell even whether the rate of growth of the rate of growth is slowing, though, due to the scale.
Omicron news
- Thread starter weltweit
- Start date
_Russ_
Never not Knowingly Misunderstood
.....ummm
teuchter
je suis teuchter
The tweet I was responding to, talks about the doubling time, in answer to the question "is it slowing down". She says "still about 2 day doubling", with the implication that it would be slowing down if the doubling time was becoming longer.
So, the rate of growth of the rate of growth is what we're talking about isn't it? In this context, slowing down to me means that we start to see a trend in the line, whether it's plotted on a log or a linear scale, that if it continues, it will curve around towards a peak, and then start going downwards. Yes, it has to be going downwards for the rate of growth itself to be decreasing, but that's not what we are initially interested in seeing - first you want to see signs that it's no longer shooting skywards in exponential fashion, then you want to see a peak appear and then of course you want to see a decline.
However...in any case when I looked more closely at those graphs last night, I realised that I don't think they are plotting absolute numbers of omicron cases, I think they are plotting proportion of all cases that are omicron cases, so they aren't actually showing what I initially though they were.
If the rate of growth is growing, that means more people are infected today than were yesterday, which means that the infection is still gathering pace. Yes, the first thing we have to look for is a slow down in the rate of growth of this rate of growth, but whilst a slowdown in acceleration is better than the opposite, it still places us in a highly vulnerable phase. Even once you pass the fastest point of an S-curve, you still have a potentially unlimited upper limit in principle.
Indeliblelink
\......👁&👁......./
Something about the fusogenicity of the spike protein being related to it's pathogenicity.
Omicron - more transmissible but less infectious. In hamsters anyway.
Omicron - more transmissible but less infectious. In hamsters anyway.
8ball
Merr xmas...
Fusogenicity is srs bsnss.
8ball
Merr xmas...
Am interested in your virology knowledge. Always thought you were a spaceman.
Obviously, your insight is welcome.
And Merr Xmas obv.
(I just dip into this thread from time to time )
2hats
Dust.
Have variously worked in both space- and biomedical-related disciplines over the years.
Pfft. Knows about space and viruses and disappearing planes and nuclear stuff and weather and bats? You're clearly an evil supervillain posting from your secret lair underneath a volcano somewhere
Pfft. Knows about space and viruses and disappearing planes and nuclear stuff and weather and bats? You're clearly an evil supervillain posting from your secret lair underneath a volcano somewhere
2hats
Dust.
I do have a cat on my lap right now.Pfft. Knows about space and viruses and disappearing planes and nuclear stuff and weather and bats? You're clearly an evil supervillain posting from your secret lair underneath a volcano somewhere
White? Fluffy?
2hats
Dust.
Speaking of tropism shifts, you might want to consider continuing (or resuming) swabbing tonsils as well as nose for LFTs...
Indeed...
www.medrxiv.org
PS The cats are neither white nor fluffy.
Google Translation said:
Indeed...
Saliva swabs are the preferred sample for Omicron detection
The Omicron variant is characterised by more than 50 distinct mutations, the majority of which are located in the spike protein. The implications of these mutations for disease transmission, tissue tropism and diagnostic testing are still to be determined. We evaluated the relative performance...
PS The cats are neither white nor fluffy.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
One of the unknowns about omicron was whether or not it would drive out delta, potentially a big benefit to places like the UK that were running very high delta. There was encouraging news the other day about how delta and omicron infections both provide cross-protection against the other, and the data from the UK is also encouraging in that regard.
Latest testing figures suggest that it may already be driving delta right down. Nearly 95% of cases are coming up omicron now. With total cases at around 200k a day, that translates to 10,000 delta cases per day, down from 50,000 a month ago. That's a big fall.
Essentially, in this graph, green is probable delta and purple is probable omicron.
https://assets.publishing.service.g...44331/20211230_OS__Omicron_Daily_Overview.pdf
Latest testing figures suggest that it may already be driving delta right down. Nearly 95% of cases are coming up omicron now. With total cases at around 200k a day, that translates to 10,000 delta cases per day, down from 50,000 a month ago. That's a big fall.
Essentially, in this graph, green is probable delta and purple is probable omicron.
https://assets.publishing.service.g...44331/20211230_OS__Omicron_Daily_Overview.pdf
ska invita
back on the other side
Liked reading this with the fireworks
weltweit
Well-Known Member
I don't think necessarily they have to no.
BigMoaner
What A Load of Old Bollocks
sorry bad english from me - i mean do they always have progressively less severe symptoms? the delta was slightly less worse than the original, and then omnicron etc.
2hats
Dust.
If there is selection pressure to do so.
l'Otters
.
I've seen a lot of people argue this is the case, and a whole load of people (who should know better imo) taking reports of omicron being "milder" as confirmation of this "rule", and evidence that we're on the home stretch with covid now.
weltweit
Well-Known Member
The virus isn't intelligent, variants are produced almost at random and if they work, or infect a good number of hosts, then they can gain traction.
I think we have been lucky in this case that Omicron seems to be less lethal than Delta.
I am not an expert but my understanding is that it could be possible a new variant may arise that is both infectious and more deadly.
I think we have been lucky in this case that Omicron seems to be less lethal than Delta.
I am not an expert but my understanding is that it could be possible a new variant may arise that is both infectious and more deadly.
2hats
Dust.
You can't make direct comparisons between variants from different timepoints when your population's immunity profile is changing over time.
Supine
Newt Member
So no. Sometimes yes, sometimes no. It changes with conditions on the ground.
elbows
Well-Known Member
Studies tended to conclude that Delta came with a notable increase in hospitalisation risk compared to earlier versions of the virus, not a reduced risk.
Such studies may be imperfect and they do have to adjust for certain things, which these days very much includes vaccination history of the people whose outcomes they use as data for the study. And we end up with estimates rather than completely rigid facts. But I think such signals for Delta were strong enough that its reasonable to conclude it was both more transmissible and more likely to result in hospitalisation, and quite a lot more likely at that. The only reason that the increased disease severity is not obvious when looking in a simple way at the UK Delta wave is the high level of vaccination in the UK.
8ball
Merr xmas...
Kind of. Until 3 weeks before the end of season special.
