Discover and read the best of Twitter Threads about #APOLLOSARROW
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It's been exactly 3 years since I pinned this thread of threads re #COVID19. The early threads prompted me to write #ApollosArrow which has stood the test of time, I think (amazon.com/Apollos-Arrow-…).
And, as forecast, the pandemic is ending. I'm unpinning the thread—on schedule.
And, as forecast, the pandemic is ending. I'm unpinning the thread—on schedule.
*subject to the low-likelihood emergence of a novel strain of the virus that fully evades our vaccines or that is much deadlier. ;-)
This piece in the @WSJ (wsj.com/articles/the-l…), published on October 16, 2020, laid out the likely course of the pandemic, and we are still on track. We are now late into the "intermediate phase" and will put the pandemic fully behind us in 2024. #ApollosArrow
Europe is having a 500 year drought. bbc.com/news/world-eur…
This may result in us seeing warnings from our ancestors long ago, in a particular manifestation of cultural transmission that has always amazed me. #BLUEPRINTbook 1/
This may result in us seeing warnings from our ancestors long ago, in a particular manifestation of cultural transmission that has always amazed me. #BLUEPRINTbook 1/
In #BLUEPRINTbook (amazon.com/Blueprint-Evol…), I talk about very old warnings regarding low-water marks in European rivers. For instance, the Elbe is dotted with “hunger stones” commemorating old droughts, with inscriptions like IF YOU SEE ME, WEEP, going back 500 years. 2/
These hunger stones written on rocks deep in rivers by our ancestors -- both to commemorate their own suffering and to warn us -- are sure to be visible again given conditions in Europe today. There is so little water. 3/
Serious epidemics, like COVID19, affect mental health – both in short and intermediate terms. Let’s talk about this. 1/
Some initial analyses of the COVID19 epidemic suggested that mental health impact might not be as bad as many had feared. Indeed, in early days of the pandemic, people were surprised to not see a stark rise in suicide (though other mental health indicators did show problems). 2/
One study journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.117… concluded that psychological distress increased early in the COVID-19 pandemic but that most facets returned to pre-pandemic levels by mid-2020, and that there were notable signs of resilience in life satisfaction, loneliness, and suicide. 3/
New work via @jepekar et al in @ScienceMagazine shows that there may have been two zoonotic leaps of SARS2 to humans in late 2019. science.org/doi/10.1126/sc… 1/
SARS2 genomic diversity before Feb 2020 likely comprised two distinct viral lineages (A & B), probably a result of two separate transmissions to humans. The first likely involved lineage B around 18 Nov 2019 (23 Oct–8 Dec), and the second (of A) likely occurred soon after. 2/
In early work on the origins of the pandemic that we published in @Nature in April of 2020, we used phone data to track human movements through Wuhan and showed how the virus initially spread through China. nature.com/articles/s4158… 3/
Omicron BA5 is the dominant variant of SARS2 in USA at the moment (although new COVID19 variants will surely soon appear and take its place). These variant waves are nicely visualized in UK data. We should prepare as a nation for this evolving landscape. Let's talk about this. 1/ 
The reasons for BA5's success (and for omicron's more generally) relate both to its intrinsically greater infectivity and its ability to re-infect previously infected or even vaccinated people. (See, eg, this article from Feb 2022 via @sigallab ): nature.com/articles/s4157… 2/
Nice and informative epidemiological data from the UK SIREN study help shed light on BA5's ability to reinfect people. 3/
Important new work just out via @nature shows that SARS-CoV-2 is associated with (at least short-term) changes in brain structure. nature.com/articles/s4158… 1/
The analysis investigated brain changes in 785 UK participants (aged 51–81) imaged twice, including 401 cases who tested positive for infection with SARS-CoV-2 between their two scans, with 141 days on average separating their diagnosis and second scan. 2/
There were significant longitudinal effects when comparing SARS-2 infected and uninfected people: reduction in grey matter thickness in orbitofrontal cortex and parahippocampal gyrus, tissue damage in regions connected to olfactory cortex, and reduction in global brain size. 3/
Let’s talk about natural immunity (NI) versus vaccine-induced immunity (VI) to SARS2. This has become controversial. If you survive COVID19 infection, what does that mean, immunologically and practically (given current state of knowledge and current state of the pandemic)? 1/
This is a SUPER long thread (with recent research) on a topic that has become weirdly politicized (as I learned – though I should have known with anything COVID19-related! – after my recent interview with @SamHarrisOrg ). So buckle up. 2/
I also mention this topic of natural versus vaccine-induced immunity in this 17-minute interview with @hari on @AmanpourCoPBS released last night. 3/
As expected, early studies are beginning to appear about omicron immune escape using in vitro assessments. We will also have large scale epidemiological studies, which are key. 1/
Leading scientist @sigallab who authored this paper on escape of SARS-CoV-2 501Y.V2 from neutralization by convalescent plasma in @nature in March nature.com/articles/s4158… just released data about immune escape and omicron using South African sample. 2/
Here is @sigallab thread on omicron immune escape: The paper will soon appear on medRxiv (and was accessible on his lab website earlier today). 3/
There’s a new COVID19 variant that has people worried. Let’s talk about “omicron.” This assessment must necessarily be very preliminary, since we are in very early days (partly thanks to South Africa generously sounding the alarm!). 1/
Three key issues are whether omicron is 1) more transmissible, 2) more deadly, and 3) more capable of evading current vaccines (or, somewhat analogously, whether it evades current antibody treatments or immunity conferred by prior natural infection, aka “immune escape”). 2/
Based on currently available technical data and on news reports from around the world, here is a *preliminary* opinion about these three issues, along with my level of confidence in these guesses. 3/
An epidemic sweeps through a population unwilling to take it seriously: Idaho -- an act in four parts.
Down with masks! March 6.
Down with vaccines! apnews.com/article/joe-bi…
Back-to-school special re #COVID19:
Here is an informative new tool via @dukeU @DEL_Duke for teachers and students to calculate their risk of infection with SARS-CoV-2 over the course of a semester, via aerosol spread. …re-modeler-data-devils.cloud.duke.edu 1/
Here is an informative new tool via @dukeU @DEL_Duke for teachers and students to calculate their risk of infection with SARS-CoV-2 over the course of a semester, via aerosol spread. …re-modeler-data-devils.cloud.duke.edu 1/
Though initially developed for use on college campuses, the calculator can also be used by K-12 schools to inform decisions on school re-openings and assess the effectiveness of different control measures for COVID19 in settings like classrooms, cafeterias, and gyms. 2/
Many caveats apply to using this tool for assessing faculty and student risk of COVID-19 in the classroom, but it is still informative. Write up here: nicholas.duke.edu/news/online-to… 3/
We are racing to vaccinate the US and worldwide population for COVID19 for many reasons: to prevent deaths, limit emergence of dangerous strains, and achieve herd immunity. Let’s talk about the spread of vaccination behavior. 1/
We can think of some of our behavioral responses to an epidemic like #COVID19 (e.g., mask wearing, getting vaccinated) as a kind of *social contagion*, spreading from person to person, which in turn addresses the *biological contagion*. 2/
In 2017, we published a reconstruction of the temporal dynamics of the spread of vaccination behavior and of the H1N1 influenza virus during the 2009 pandemic in a circumscribed social network of @harvard students. nature.com/articles/srep4… via @SciReports @nature 3/
People have been talking about the Joe Rogan Experience #JRE podcast @joerogan, which I am happy to have been on twice. I think Joe is a first-rate interviewer, a great and genuinely curious conversationalist. And the breadth of the guests is astonishing, and to his credit. 1/
The breadth of his *listeners* and his reach are also astonishing and to his credit.
Here is a short personal illustration: After my first appearance, in March of 2019, I left my apartment in New Haven @yale the next morning to walk to work. 2/
Here is a short personal illustration: After my first appearance, in March of 2019, I left my apartment in New Haven @yale the next morning to walk to work. 2/
The African-American doorman in my building, a man in his 50's with whom I have had countless warm conversations about many topics, told me he had heard me the preceding day and that he really enjoyed our conversation and "learned so much." 3/
I am ashamed of how bad our great nation has done in combatting COVID19. When China locked down its country, on January 24, 2020, we should have used that time to better prepare. #ApollosArrowChat 1/
On January 24, 2020, China essentially put 930 million people under home confinement. Along with Chinese colleagues, we showed this in this @nature paper: nature.com/articles/s4158… Movement in the country stopped. 2/
In essence, China felt that SARS-CoV-2 was so powerful that it had to detonate a "social nuclear weapon," as I argue in #APOLLOSARROW (for some details, see this thread from March 9: ) 3/
Yes, I do think that COVID19 *might* be remembered differently, in part because of the superior (electronic, real-time) documentation of our predicament. #ApollosArrowChat 1/
And yet, the Black Death had quite an impact on collective memory, as I also discuss in APOLLO'S ARROW, deploying what was, for its day, cutting edge (artistic) communications. 2/
I also think we're now more aware of the periodicity of global pandemics. We understand that they recur every 10-20 years, and have *serious* recurrences every 50-100 years (though there is no reason a serious one could not recur sooner). This is in Chapter 8 of #APOLLOSARROW 3/
Yes, I think that major cities, including NYC, will *eventually* return to normal, albeit some time in 2024. #ApollosArrowChat 1/
While it is the case that people have *always* fled cities for the country during times of plague (e.g., famously including Isaac Newton washingtonpost.com/history/2020/0… via @washingtonpost), the appeal of cities is so great that people always returned. 2/
As I argue in #apollosarrow, I think that the COVID19 pandemic will temporarily reverse worldwide trends of globalization and urbanization, but the rationales for these trends are so compelling that we will return to the status ex ante in a few years. 3/
Various experiments of ours (e.g., pnas.org/content/108/48… via @PNASNews & nature.com/articles/ncomm… via @NatureComms ) and in a prior book (#BLUEPRINTbook), I discuss how the ability to cut and form ties affects our ability to cooperate. @ApollosArrowChat 1/
The ability to form groups is crucial to the human capacity to cooperate. But the SARS-CoV-2 virus exploits this very tendency to spread among us. Hence, we spread out to reduce contagion. Your question is a good one. 2/
As I argue in #ApollosArrow, 'the spread of germs is the price we pay for the spread of ideas,' which means that we evolved to live together to derive the benefits from living socially, but we thus also place ourselves at risk of contagious pathogens. 3/
Recently, I’ve come to think we are quite LUCKY, in fact, with COVID-19 – because, although it’s quite transmissible, it could indeed have been much deadlier. There's no reason it couldn’t have been more... Medieval.
Imagine if COVID-19 had been deadlier. Let's talk about it. 1/
Imagine if COVID-19 had been deadlier. Let's talk about it. 1/
Ten months into the pandemic, we know that COVID-19 has an R0 of about 2.5-3.0. That is quite infectious. That’s about twice as transmissible as the seasonal flu, but much less than smallpox or measles. jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/… 2/
We also know quite a bit about how deadly COVID-19 is. The infection fatality rate (IFR – fraction of infected people who die) is 0.5-0.8%; and the case fatality rate (CFR – fraction of people who come to medical attention who die) is about twice that. reader.elsevier.com/reader/sd/pii/… 3/
Some of the ideas and themes of my forthcoming book on the COVID-19 pandemic, APOLLO'S ARROW: THE PROFOUND AND ENDURING IMPACT OF CORONAVIRUS ON THE WAY WE LIVE, bit.ly/apollosarrow which is out on October 27 via @lbsparkbooks, have been sketched by a few essays I've done. 1/
On March 11, an argument in @washingtonpost about how the epidemic virus, while exploiting our social nature, would require the same social nature (including our capacity for cooperation and teaching) to combat it washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/… (see Chapter 6 of #APOLLOSARROW) 2/
On August 10, an essay in @TheEconomist on innate qualities of SARS-CoV-2 that make it a tricky virus to combat, including its ‘dispersion parameter’ that yields super-spreader events and its asymptomatic transmission economist.com/by-invitation/… (see Chapter 2 of #APOLLOSARROW) 3/
Extremely sobering new analysis via my colleagues @lhsummers & @Cutler_econ in @JAMA_current concludes that SARS-CoV-2 is a "$16 Trillion Virus" ja.ma/3diC0U9 1/
The economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is huge:
1) $200,000 per family; or
2) 90% of a year’s GDP; or
3) 4 times the output loss of the Great Recession; or
4) 2 times the cost of all wars since 9/11; or
5) roughly the cost of climate change in the next 50 years. 2/
1) $200,000 per family; or
2) 90% of a year’s GDP; or
3) 4 times the output loss of the Great Recession; or
4) 2 times the cost of all wars since 9/11; or
5) roughly the cost of climate change in the next 50 years. 2/
About half the 16 trillion dollar [sic] economic impact of COVID is lost GDP, and the other half is the various health consequences. 3/
Let’s talk about the “Swiss cheese model” of combatting the COVID-19 pandemic. This is a classic conceptualization of how to cope with hazards, and it powerfully illustrates several features of what we are facing in the pandemic. #SwissCheeseModel (Image h/t @MackayIM) 1/
What is required to stop the spread of a pathogen like SARS-CoV-2 is achieving some kind of (minimum) threshold level of response sufficient to achieve a deflection in the trajectory of the epidemic, to bring it under control. 2/
A combination of “contact reduction” interventions (eg, school closures, gathering bans) and “transmission reduction” interventions (eg, handwashing, masking) is required. These are “non-pharmaceutical interventions” (NPI), in contrast to things like medicines and vaccines. 3/
POTUS is now reported to have COVID symptoms, which, combined with his other baseline risk factors, is concerning. cnn.com/2020/10/02/pol… Most likely, he will recover, but the medical path is not assured and the political implications are substantial.
POTUS is confirmed to have fever and cough, consistent with *lower* respiratory infection. If hospitalized, this will indicate even greater severity. The coming week will be very indicative of likely path he will take through this serious viral illness.
If he is hospitalized in the coming days (and not simply and truly out of an abundance of caution), POTUS will be facing a roughly 1 in 6 chance of death from COVID19.
If he is intubated, the risk will be higher still.
People to whom he spread the disease may also get sick. 3/
If he is intubated, the risk will be higher still.
People to whom he spread the disease may also get sick. 3/
This video, from old work of ours, shows how a respiratory virus spreads across social ties, inexorably, and it illustrates the sort of time course we can expect to occur in a social group like the (mask-less) staff around POTUS. We will hear soon of more cases. 1/
One of the reasons politicians and celebrities contract diseases early in an epidemic, as discussed in #APOLLOSARROW, is precisely that they are often central in social networks, and have many interactions. It's not just that we hear about such people because of their fame. 2/
During past pandemics, including the 1890 and 1918 pandemics, many world leaders contracted infections, as discussed in #APOLLOSARROW (amazon.com/Apollos-Arrow-…). We are seeing this again in 2020, with Johnson, Bolsonaro, and Trump. 3/
Inventing a #COVID19 vaccine is just a first step. For it to make a material difference in the pandemic, we must also manufacture and distribute it, and people must take it (with confidence that it's safe). Let’s talk about the often-overlooked, unsexy problem of DISTRIBUTION. 1/
There are many efforts afoot using diverse biological approaches to develop a vaccine. I think it is likely one will be invented – though how safe and effective it will be, and when it will appear, are still far from certain. 2/
As discussed in #APOLLOSARROW, out on October 27 amazon.com/Apollos-Arrow-…, the many steps necessary before widespread vaccination takes place may mean it does not arrive before we reach herd immunity anyway, in 2022 or so. So a vaccine may not materially shorten the pandemic. 3/
