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Alina Chan Profile picture
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4 Nov, 4 tweets, 3 min read
“Due to the discovery of a mutated infection in mink, which weakens the ability to form antibodies, resolute action is needed. It is necessary to kill all mink,” Mette Frederiksen, Denmark’s prime minister. ft.com/content/cdca74… via @financialtimes
These mink SARS2 genomes from Denmark are not on the @GISAID database yet - so like @firefoxx66 said in the FT article, scientists cannot tell how extensive the mutations are and what impact this will have on vaccines, diagnostics, or therapeutics.
"The virus mutation has so far been found to have spread to 12 individuals who have been found to have an impaired reaction to antibodies, which could mean that any future vaccine will not have the intended effect."
@CovidCg @atchen_ @shingheizhan time to add a species feature to the covidcg.org resource

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More from @Ayjchan

Alina Chan Profile picture
6 Nov
Maybe @WHO forgot, but in 2004, the intermediate host of SARS was found within a week of diagnosing an index patient. When you know what to look for, it doesn't necessarily take years.
"When possible SARS was diagnosed in the waitress on January 2, 2004, serum, throat and rectal swabs were obtained from all 6 palm civets at the restaurant... Serum samples from employees of the restaurant were obtained on January 4."
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/P…
Yes, in the past, tracing some outbreaks could take years because people had no idea what they were looking for - which species could have been the intermediate host or the ultimate virus reservoir (bats). But China already developed extensive know-how from the SARS1 outbreak...
Read 15 tweets
Alina Chan Profile picture
5 Nov
On the topic of controversial SARS2 mutations. I've been delaying a thread on D614G because I think people watching US elections do not have the emotional/mental bandwidth to deal with complex analyses.

But it looks like the election results won't be known for days, so...
How does the D614G variant affect public health measures, vaccines, and therapeutics?

As far as we know - there is no impact.

The paper claiming that it increases transmissibility, says: "no significant correlation found between D614G status and hospitalization status"
Furthermore, the D614G mutant has been one of the earliest variants in each country (except China and a few exceptions) since the beginning - it's not like this strain suddenly appeared later in the pandemic - covered in this thread:
Read 27 tweets
Alina Chan Profile picture
5 Nov
On the question of how mink outbreaks can impact vaccines, antibody therapeutics, or diagnostics. How realistic is this concern?

The idea is that SARS2 spreading and adapting in large populations of different host species can result in the generation of more diverse viruses.
This process can be demonstrated in the lab. To study SARS2 vaccine efficacy in mice, scientists passaged the human SARS2 virus 6 times in aged mice and derived a mouse-adapted form of SARS2 with 5 nucleotide mutations. science.sciencemag.org/content/369/65…
In the case of mink farms, where thousands are stacked in rooms of crammed cages, this creates a nightmare scenario of the virus sweeping through thousands of animals, and even from farm to farm.
This is different from your pet dog or cat, unless you have cages and cages of them.
Read 10 tweets
Alina Chan Profile picture
4 Nov
This is really unreasonable. If you have the right to vote, why are you stopping other people from voting or preventing their votes from being counted?
If there's one thing this election has shown - it's not that Trump or Biden are superior - it's that people no longer have a way of connecting with each other, respecting each other's values.

We have to stop preaching to our own choirs and start treating each other with dignity.
I started really using @twitter this year and I realized that the algorithms are not designed to unify this country. Your algorithms (also @facebook) are destroying the greatest country in this world, by making it more and more difficult for people to relate to each other.
Read 6 tweets
Alina Chan Profile picture
3 Nov
One question that many people ask me is "how likely is a lab escape vs natural origins of SARS2?"

And everyone complains when I refuse to give some kind of probability estimate. tbh I see this as a trick question because there is no evidence of either scenario at this point.
What we know is that none of the animals from the initially blamed seafood market or even any animals tested in the province of Hubei have been found positive for SARS2. See the interview response from the WIV. sciencemag.org/news/2020/07/t…
Shi Zhengli even says "We have done bat virus surveillance in Hubei Province for many years, but have not found... any coronaviruses that are closely related to SARS-CoV-2. I don't think the spillover from bats to humans occurred in Wuhan or in Hubei Province."
Read 44 tweets
Alina Chan Profile picture
2 Nov
“there is still no transparent, independent investigation into the source of the virus. Notoriously allergic to outside scrutiny, China has impeded the effort, while leaders of the ⁦@WHO⁩ , if privately frustrated, have largely ceded control” nytimes.com/2020/11/02/wor…
On the “powerful evidence” suggesting that SARS2 transmitted naturally from animals into humans...
Regarding the closest bat virus genome to SARS2...
Read 5 tweets

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