California’s virus strain looks increasingly dangerous: ‘The devil is already here’
A coronavirus variant that emerged in mid-2020 and surged to become the dominant strain in California doesn’t just spread more readily than its predecessors, it also evades antibodies generated by COVID-19 vaccines or prior infection and it’s associated with severe illness and death, researchers said.
In a study that helps explain the state’s dramatic surge in COVID-19 cases and deaths — and portends further trouble ahead — scientists at the University of California, San Francisco said the mutations that characterize the strain should mark it as a “variant of concern” on par with those from the United Kingdom, South Africa and Brazil.
“The devil is already here,” said Dr. Charles Chiu, who led the UCSF team of geneticists, epidemiologists, statisticians and
other scientists in an analysis of the new variant, which they call B.1.427/ B.1.429. “I wish it were different. But the science is the science.”
Californians, along with the rest of the country,
have been bracing for the rise of a more transmissible coronavirus variant from the U.K. known as B.1.1.7. But they should know that a rival strain that is probably just as worrisome has already settled in and will probably account for 90% of the state’s infections by the end of next month, said Chiu, an infectious-diseases researcher and physician.
The U.K. and California variants are each armed with enhanced capabilities, and the likelihood that they could circulate in the same population raises the specter of a return to spiking infections and deaths, Chiu said. It also opens the door to a “nightmare scenario”: That the two viruses will meet in a single person, swap their mutations, and create an even more dangerous strain of the SARSCoV-2 virus, which causes COVID-19.
The new evidence that the California variant could make people sicker, and vaccines less effective, should spur more intensive efforts to drive down infections, Chiu said. Those should include masking, limits on public activities and a campaign of rapid vaccinations, he added.
woman who died after undergoing a double lung transplant is the first known person to contract COVID-19 from donor lungs, according to a report in the American Journal of Transplantation.
“To my knowledge, this is the first, and actually the only, documented transmission of COVID-19 to a recipient” from donated organs, said Bruce Nicely, chief clinical officer of Gift of Life Michigan, the state’s federally designated organ and tissue recovery program.
The case represents “the worst-possible scenario” to play out in the pandemic, which has killed more than half a million Americans, Nicely said, noting, however, that Gift of Life Michigan was not involved in this donation. The transplant occurred in late October at the University of Michigan Medical School in Ann Arbor.
The woman who underwent the double lung transplant had chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and tested negative for coronavirus 12 hours prior to surgery, the case report details.
The organ donor, a woman from the Upper Midwest who suffered brain death following an auto accident, also had a negative test within 48 hours of when her organs were procured.
The donor’s family reported that she had no known history of travel and didn’t have any recent COVID-19 symptoms. It was unclear whether the organ donor had exposure to a person infected with the virus.
A day after the transplant, the recipient’s heart wasn’t pumping as efficiently as expected, and two days after the transplant, she developed a fever, low blood pressure and respiratory distress.
Doctors collected samples of fluid from her lungs and tested that fluid for SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. The results were positive.
The same type of fluid from the organ donor was then also tested for coroA navirus, and also yielded a positive result.
Soon after, a thoracic surgeon who performed the transplant surgery also tested positive for the virus. Whole genome sequencing of all three people showed that the disease likely originated in the organ donor, and spread to the recipient and the surgeon during transplantation.
The woman who had the double lung transplant died about two months after her transplant surgery.
The research suggests transplant centers and organ procurement organizations should consider testing lower respiratory tract samples of potential lung donors to ensure the virus won’t be passed to transplant recipients. It also suggests that health careworkers should don full personal protective equipment, including eyewear and N95 masks, when performing lung-transplant surgeries and organ procurement.
Re the Feb. 21 op-ed, “With the death of talkradio titan Rush Limbaugh, conservatism needs a new voice:” While I don’t doubt writer Michael Ryan’s sincerity, I do wonder at his holding Limbaugh up as a hero of the conservative cause.
Has anyone been a greater supporter of, and apologist for, Donald Trump’s continual disdain for truth, honor, and democratic principles than Limbaugh? Did he ever dare to question any of the lies Trump told the world during his presidency?
If this is the kind of voice Ryan thinks conservatism needs, he’ll find that only a small portion of the American population will ever pay heed to it. Too many have seen where it led Trump, and how it led our country to the disaster of a Trump-inspired insurrection.
Whatever new voice conservatism finds, let us hope it’s very different from either Limbaugh’s or Trump’s.
– Edward Mast, Miami