This was my first illustration for the diary. I thought the shark swimming in Covid was more catchy.
You can read the scientific article “Rates of SARS-CoV-2 transmission and vaccination impact the fate of vaccine-resistant strains” in its entirety” from Nature here. The findings are summarized here. This is the most important takeaway:
Every time a virus particle replicates itself, there's a chance its library of genes will tumble into a new configuration. Any one of those configurations could potentially outwit an immune system that's already received a vaccine, leaving us all unprotected once more.
Here’s a related article which presents the worst case scenario:
Excerpt:
Not only is the pandemic showing no signs of easing just yet, the emergence of new variants of COVID-19 is complicating things. If a new virus is contained fairly quickly, it has less chance of evolving into a more deadly version.
SARS was stopped in its tracks early enough to prevent many variants from emerging. In the case of COVID-19 however, the virus has had over a year to circulate across the globe and infect around 185 million people. New variants are deemed as being of concern if they are more contagious or more deadly, or more resistant to vaccines or treatments. The Delta variant that has spread worldwide at lightning speed, accounting for 90% of cases in countries like the UK, is 55% more transmissible than the Alpha variant, which itself was 50% more transmissible than the original virus.
Now, it looks like it could be more deadly too. A UK study found that the risk of dying after being infected with the Delta variant was 64% higher than for previous strains.
In Brazil, the Gamma variant is causing a spike in COVID-19 deaths in young and middle-aged people, who had previously been less at risk than older people. In 20 to 29-year-olds, the risk of dying tripled compared with previous strains.
What this tells us, as if we didn’t know already, is that what Kevin McCarthy and his maskless Covid defying House colleagues are doing is beyond what Nancy Pelosi has called moronic.
A moron might invite friends to a beach party in shark invested waters and wade in the very shallow water. (Advisory: Sharks will attack in waist deep water as this real life “Jaws” proved.) It takes a special level of moronity to venture into deeper waters dressed as a seal.
If a new more deadly and contagious variant of Covid emerges against which the current vaccines aren’t effective in preventing the prudent mask wearing Democrats and others both in Congress and in the public are far more likely, to put it bluntly, not to die. The Republicans who see not taking Covid precautions as a political statement might as well put on seal suits, throw some blood in the water for good measure, and swim with ravenous sharks.
On the bright side for them, getting eaten by a shark is probably a better way to leave these mortal coils than dying of Covid.
Additional related articles in my comments below.
