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Ryan Hisner Profile picture
@LongDesertTrain
May 26, 2021 • 7 tweets • 2 min read • Read on X
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1/7 Satan is trending on Twitter. I recall what Mark Twain said about him.
"I am quite sure that I have no race prejudices, and I think I have no color prejudices nor caste prejudices nor creed prejudices. Indeed, I know it..."
2/7 "I can stand any society. All that I care to know is that a man is a human being—that is enough for me; he can't be any worse."
3/7 "I have no special regard for Satan; but I can at least claim that I have no prejudice against him. It may even be that I lean a little his way, on account of his not having a fair show."
4/ "All religions issue bibles against him & say the most injurious things about him,but we never hear his side. We have none but the evidence for the prosecution, yet we have rendered the verdict. To my mind, this is irregular. It is un-English; it is un-American; it is French."
5/7 "We may not pay [Satan] reverence, for that would be indiscreet, but we can at least respect his talents."
6/7 "A person who has for untold centuries maintained the imposing position of spiritual head of four-fifths of the human race, and political head of the whole of it, must be granted the possession of executive abilities of the loftiest order."
7/7 "In [Satan's] large presence the other popes and politicians shrink to midges for the microscope. I would like to see him. I would rather see him and shake him by the tail than any other member of the European Concert."

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More from @LongDesertTrain

Ryan Hisner Profile picture
Jun 10
Another fantastic preprint on BA.3.2's propensity for children, this time from @yunlong_cao & co.
They not only confirm the findings of David Ho's lab (that kids have ~0 antibody response to BA.3.2) but dig into the details of exactly why kids are so vulnerable to BA.3.2.

1/4
Two big wins for vaccination & mRNA vaccines:

1. Kids vaccinated before being infected have robust antibodies against BA.3.2

2. Unvaxed adults much more vulnerable to BA.3.2, esp. compared to mRNA-vaxed adults.

Read @yunlong_cao's 🧵 & very readable paper for details. 2/4 Image
There's still one major paradox here I can't wrap my head around: countries with the highest vaccination rates & the lowest proportion of children appear—very low sequencing makes hard conclusions difficult—to have the highest proportion of BA.3.2. 3/4
Read 6 tweets
Ryan Hisner Profile picture
Jun 4
New data from David Ho's lab showing that while adults & kids have ~equal antibody responses to XFG & NB.1.8.1, children have essentially no neutralizing antibodies to BA.3.2.

This seems to largely solve the BA.3.2 + kids mystery. 1/14 Image
If you've missed the story about how BA.3.2 (a novel, divergent saltation variant) is hugely overrepresented in sequences from children, this was my original (very quick) analysis, which subsequent data extended & confirmed. 2/
More details from this preprint. 50 is the limit of detection (i.e. zero). Nearly all kids under 7 had no detectable nAbs to BA.3.2, despite robust nAb titers against NB.1.8.1 & XFG.

Notably, most kids also had zero nAbs to ancestral D614G or XBB.1.5. 3/
biorxiv.org/content/10.648…Image
Read 14 tweets
Ryan Hisner Profile picture
Mar 26
So it's clear that BA.3.2 preferentially infects children, something we have never seen before in a SARS-CoV-2 variant.

Why?

The question's baffled me, but after a suggestion from Darren Martin, I think I have an explanation that makes sense.
1/16
I've tried to make sense of BA.3.2's penchant for kids by considering its unique spike: more compact, more closed, & more antibody-evasive than any other variant.

But I think another feature of BA.3.2 is responsible: its wholesale deletion of ORF7a, ORF7b, & ORF8 (∆ORF78).
2/
∆ORF78 is rare but not unheard of; it was in several late XBB variants (GW.5.1.1, FW.1.1, GE.1.2, etc) & a few branches of other variants. I've long thought these late XBB had an advantage in some population subsector, but I didn't suspect kids.
3/
Read 18 tweets
Ryan Hisner Profile picture
Mar 24
You have to wonder for how long we will continue seeing infections from 2020 continue to show up (in absurdly high quantities) in wastewater.
1/16
I suspect that the number of people continuously infected since 2020 or 2021 is much larger than we realize. It's impossible to prove, but there are case studies where a chronically infected person gets infected by a new variant, which drives out the original virus...
2/16
...which consequently leaves no trace that the person was chronically infected before the super-infecting variant—took over.

Why then are some Cryptic WW variants resistant to being outcompeted by newer variants?
3/16
Read 16 tweets
Ryan Hisner Profile picture
Mar 22
While the final outcome for BA.3.2 is uncertain, its unique characteristics—extensively remodeled spike NTD & SD1/SD2, novel S2 muts, & total deletion of ORF7a/7b/8—make it the best candidate for co-dominance we've seen, which could mark a new era in SARS-2 evolution. 1/
Until now, the broad pattern of SARS-2 evolution has been:

1) Emergence of a saltation variant originating in a chronic infection

2) Rapid growth/global dominance & a variant-driven wave of infection—especially if it emerges in late fall/winter (BA.1, XBB.1.5, JN.1). 2/
3) Stepwise evolution over the next few months/years, usually without driving major waves (the JN.1-descended KP.3.1.1 being a notable exception).

4) Repeat

3/
Read 34 tweets
Ryan Hisner Profile picture
Dec 29, 2025
Very proud to be a co-author on this comprehensive preprint on the novel, growing saltation lineage BA.3.2, together with @Tuliodna, Darren Martin, Dikeledi Kekana, and lead author @graemedor. 1/9
I would normally write a summary 🧵 of the BA.3.2 mutational analysis here, but as much of my contribution parallels my previous BA.3.2 threads I'll just link to those here, w/brief descriptions of each.

This is my first, big-picture BA.3.2 🧵. 2/9
Short thread from June when the first travel BA.3.2 sequences showed up. I think my prediction from back then has pretty much been borne out. 3/9
Read 9 tweets

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