{"id":746,"date":"2020-03-11T19:30:00","date_gmt":"2020-03-11T19:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/?p=746"},"modified":"2020-11-09T19:34:38","modified_gmt":"2020-11-09T19:34:38","slug":"why-are-we-all-so-worried-about-covid-19-and-whats-the-difference-in-terminology-between-sars-cov-2-and-covid-19-and-mutations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/?p=746","title":{"rendered":"Why are we all so worried about COVID-19? AND What\u2019s the difference in terminology between SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19? AND Mutations?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Question:<\/strong> Why are we all so worried about COVID-19?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Answer:<\/strong> First off, you\u2019re probably <60 years of age and you\u2019re probably in pretty good health. You\u2019re probably thinking that you personally, do not need to worry about yourself \u2014 yeah, you\u2019ll probably get COVID-19 within the next year or so and yeah, being sick sucks. But being sick isn\u2019t the end of the world! So, why the freak out? Is it warranted?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u00b7 Yes, the widespread action \u2014 of the right kind \u2014 is warranted. (examples of the right kind of action are\u00a0here<\/a>) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u00b7 First, we need to protect the elderly, especially those with underlying conditions like heart or lung disease. Data from China reveal that folks age 80+ who get COVID-19 are at very high risk of adverse outcomes, including death \u2014 15 of every 100 individuals age 80+ who contract COVID-19 die. In a situation like this, where we have no vaccination and no treatment, it is imperative that we try to minimize the elderly\u2019s exposure to COVID-19. This means that we also need to try and avoid getting sick. And if we are getting sick, we need to stay home and avoid interactions with others as much as possible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u00b7 Second, we need to protect our health system. Data from China also show that about 20% of all COVID-19 cases are serious and require medical treatment, including hospitalization. Our health system will be overrun if we all become sick at the same(ish) time. This will lead to terrible health outcomes not just for those infected with COVID-19, but for those who need to access the health system for everything else! Death rates sky rocket when health systems aren\u2019t functioning. This is why social distancing measures are so imperative. We need to \u201cblunt the curve\u201d (see graphic below) so that even if all of us do end up becoming sick from COVID-19, we\u2019re doing it at staggered times and not overwhelming the health system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u00b7 We need to be concerned and we need to be taking proactive action to help our most vulnerable and to help our health system respond.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u00b7 Finally, unlike flu, we have no treatments and no vaccine for COVID-19 an no herd immunity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Question:<\/strong> What\u2019s the difference in terminology between SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Answer: <\/strong>SARS-CoV-2 is the virus and COVID-19 is the disease. Think of it like HIV\/AIDS. HIV is the virus, AIDS is the disease.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Question:<\/strong> What\u2019s the story with virus mutations?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Answer:<\/strong> [providing a synthesis of a good article from Science<\/a>] Like all viruses, SARS-CoV-2 evolves over time through random mutations, only some of which are caught and corrected by the virus\u2019s error correction machinery. SARS-CoV-2 accumulates an average of about one to two mutations per month, which is a slower rate than the flu. Scientists have been sharing SARS-CoV-2 genome sequences on the online platform GISAID and studying these sequences to a) answer the basic question as to which pathology is causing the disease (e.g. identify a novel coronavirus); and b) analyze how the virus is changing over time and place. The first piece is obviously critical. This second piece is also very important, but it can lead to over-interpretation of results. On the positive side, genome sequencing led scientists to correctly conclude that the new coronavirus had been circulating in Washington State for quite some time before being detected. On the flip side, it has led to over-interpretation \u2014 like a scientist concluding that the outbreak in Italy came from cases in Munich using a small dataset that was insufficient to make such a claim.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Image<\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Question: Why are we all so worried about COVID-19? Answer: First off, you\u2019re probably <60 years of age and you\u2019re probably in pretty good health. You\u2019re probably thinking that you personally, do not need to worry about yourself \u2014 yeah, you\u2019ll probably get COVID-19 within the next year or so and yeah, being sick sucks. But being […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":747,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[60,17],"tags":[103,123],"class_list":["post-746","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-risk","category-risk-reduction","tag-mutations","tag-social-distance","fallback-thumbnail"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/covidqanda.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/March-12.jpeg?fit=930%2C953&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/746","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=746"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/746\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":748,"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/746\/revisions\/748"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/747"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=746"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=746"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covidqanda.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=746"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}