Britain is the pariah of Europe, this time, not just because of Brexit, but because of the development of a new strain of COVID19. I warned months ago that an inevitable consequence of lockdowns would be that it would extend the period in which the virus was at large, and would, thereby, mutate into new strains, which would make matters much worse. That has now happened, but this will not be the only new strain that has developed, and others are likely to create much worse problems.
Predicting that lockdowns would result in the development of new strains of COVID19 was simply a matter of applying basic evolutionary biology. All organisms continually change. We recently found, for example, that many humans today are different to those of just 50 years ago, having more bones in some parts of their body, additional blood vessels and so on. As a rule of thumb, the simpler the organism, the faster the rate of change, because any modification in the genome, represents a larger proportional change in the organism. Some changes are beneficial, others disadvantageous. Members of the species that have disadvantageous characteristics die out, those that have beneficial characteristics prosper, and multiply, becoming dominant.
As scientists at Edinburgh University concluded, months ago, the issue was not the number of infections, but the number of people in the vulnerable 20% that were infected. Their Report in arguing for a policy of shielding, says,
As basic evolutionary biology tells us, the basis of these changes is that any characteristics that give an advantage to members of the species, for the material conditions that exist, are the ones that prosper, an become dominant. So, again, one of the things that lockdowns did was to make it more difficult for the virus to spread. Those individual members of the COVID19 species that were able to overcome that limitation imposed by the lockdown, therefore, were given a natural advantage, and so prospered. Lockdowns not only created the changed material conditions in which more virulent strains of the virus were given an advantage, but they also gave the time for the virus to be at large so that those particular strains had the time to multiply and to become dominant, which has now happened in Britain.
Compare that with if the virus had been able to spread freely, but only amongst the 80% of the population that suffer no serious effects from it. Then the more virulent strains would have had no natural advantage, and so this new strain would not have developed, or become dominant. More importantly, because this natural vaccination of the population through infection, would have meant that tens of millions of people would have become immune to the virus. That would have created the required herd immunity that artificial vaccination, is only now beginning to offer, but which will take months to bring about. If there had been no lockdowns, but the vulnerable 20% of the population had been effectively shielded, then herd immunity would have developed within a short period, and the virus would have found no hosts to infect, meaning it would have died out, and along with it any chance of its mutation to the new strain.
Indeed, its not just lockdowns that lead to that result, but even the use of test and trace where that had been effective. It too simply slowed down the rate of infection, drawing out the period when the virus was at large. Its not surprising that countries that appeared to benefit from test and trace are also now seeing sharp increases in infection rates. Fortunately, it is usual the case with pathogens that those that are more contagious are also less deadly, because its not in the interest of the virus to kill off its potential hosts. So, there is no indication that the new strain is any more lethal than its earlier strains, not is there any indication that it is more serious for the 80% of the population that suffered no serious effects from the virus.
The rational response continues to be, therefore, to end lockdowns, and to put all of society's resources into shielding the 20% of the population actually at risk from COVID19, primarily the elderly, and those with immune compromising conditions.
Isn't it far more likely that the emergence of this new more contagious strain will be blamed by the West's unwillingness to pursue a policy of eradication, as China, Vietnam, New Zealand and Australia (NSW excepted) all did so successfully?
ReplyDeleteEven the hope that the virus could be contained by a test and trace system (which seems to have been the planned lockdown exit strategy for European countries, once they'd gone beyond the narrow goal of preventing the disease overwhelming health care systems: in the UK I suspect Boris Johnson's near-death experience may have been the trigger) now looks to have been a false hope.
If South Korea (with the best test and trace system in the world) eventually lost control of the virus (as they did last month: perhaps pre-Christmas family gatherings were the culprit?), what chance did European countries ever have?
The fact that South Korea lost control - as I always said they would - is indication that its only a matter of time before we see that China, NZ etc. will have lost control, because even if you have eradicated the virus in your own borders - which I doubt they actually have anyway - you have not eradicated it from the world, and your population is like a forest of dry tinder waiting to be ignited as soon as nay virus is let loose on it. With the new more virulent strain that is even more likely. Their only hope is being able to quickly vaccinate enough people in those countries to gain herd immunity.
ReplyDeleteThe fact is that the strategy of lockdown and test and trace could never work, and hasn't.
The piece in redline by Dr. Malcolm Kendrick is interesting. It reinforces my argument that authorities have idiotically put all their emphasis on infections rather than on serious illness and death.
Indeed, a zero-Covid policy (as we have seen in Australia, New Zealand and China) does mean living a hair-trigger away from harsh lockdown until the population is vaccinated, and many of its advocates (Devi Sridhar being the most egregious) are thoroughly dishonest about that fact, as well as the fact that airtight border quarantine is also an absolute necessity.
ReplyDeleteIf we hadn't had Brexit to poison Westminster's relations with both Holyrood and Dublin, do you think a zero-Covid policy based on sealing off the entire Common Travel Area (as sealing the Irish border or the border between the UK's constituent nations would not be practical) would have been workable?
As for China, the strongest evidence that they have indeed eradicated the virus from their territory comes from the New South Wales Department of Health. All travellers entering Australia (AFAIK only citizens and permanent residents are allowed) must spend two week in quarantine and be tested, and the NSW Department of Health keeps a record of every flight since the 23 February which had at least one infected person on board.
Not one of these flights was from mainland China (even though for many months now Sydney is the only Australian airport with flights from there), and none have come from Hong Kong either since 23 March.
Another point: wasn't the extreme lockdown of Hubei Province (whose success inspired all the other lockdowns around the world) only possible precisely because it was only that province that was locked down, not the entire country?
ReplyDeletePeople in Hubei weren't allowed to leave their homes even to buy food and instead the government delivered food to their homes: surely that would only be possible because they could deploy (most likely military) manpower from across the whole of China just to keep Hubei fed, and the maths simply wouldn't work if they'd attempted such a lockdown nationwide.
George,
ReplyDeleteAs I've said before, no I don't think sealing borders is a workable solution - other than in the very short term, that might be required to prevent the spread of some pathogen that has a very high mortality rate, such as say Ebola. Nor do I think, it is a wide course of action in relation to COVID, even if it were practical, because why would you impose that on yourself for a virus that is generally less harmful than Seasonal Flu, but which specifically targets the elderly, amongst whom it has a higher mortality rate. The obvious solution was always to isolate the relatively small, and known, minority from infection not to try to isolate a large and uncontrollably growing majority of unknown carriers.
Even if China had eradicated the virus - which I still doubt - how long before it flares again as China trades with the rest of the world? Particularly, how long before some new strain of the virus spreads like wildfire.
The example of Hubei is a case in point. When the authorities thought they had eradicated the virus earlier this year, and started to release the lockdown, cases began to quickly emerge in neighbouring territories resulting in a reimposition of controls and their extension to these neighbouring provinces.
Vaccinations would solve it, but in Britain, at the current rate of vaccination, it will take two years to vaccinate 50 million people. You can't lock down for that long, and in any case, as I said, with around a quarter to half a million people being infected every day, the virus itself will create herd immunity long before vaccination will.
Your point is taken on China: I see that the city of Shijiazhuang (population 11 million) has now been put into lockdown (no-one allowed in or out) after 100 cases were found in Wednesday.
ReplyDelete"Zero Covid" amounts to a game of whack-a-mole that only ends with vaccination.
""Zero Covid" amounts to a game of whack-a-mole that only ends with vaccination."
ReplyDeleteAnd, not even then.
Indeed, countries that have prided themselves on eradicating the virus may find it politically almost impossible to re-open their borders even after they have been vaccinated!
DeleteBut, they will have no choice, because such autarky would led to economic and social disintegration. They will all have to admit that COVID was not the existential threat it has been made out to be, and that death and destruction on a much larger scale not only arises from other causes, but would be made immeasurably worse by the damage done by such closing of borders. Its again why strategies of lockdown or test and trace, or waiting for vaccines were idiotic.
ReplyDeleteJust because European countries (including the UK and Ireland) are not configured for trading in a manner that allows goods but not people to cross borders, doesn't mean it can't be done (which is what you are clearly implying when you bring up "autarky").
DeleteContainer ship crews can stay on their ships, airports could include isolation facilities where air crews would stay until they flew out again, and trucks could change drivers or tractor units at the border (as they have done throughout the crisis at the China/Vietnam border).
How exactly would the Czech Republic send goods to Germany by container ship, and vice versa? Germany and France could do that, but why would they, when it would involved considerable cost and time to do so compared to just driving the stuff by land from one to the other. Indeed, that's why most of Britain's trade with the EU goes by lorry through the Chunnel. The same is true of North American trade between USA, Canada, and Mexico, and South American trade. The same is true of Asian trade other than for trade with islands or peninsula.
ReplyDeleteYou could have drivers or tractor units change at borders, but the cost of doing that for all such trade is huge, and the logistics would be mind-blowing. In short, its not feasible or desirable, or necessary.
While it wouldn't be total autarky, trading in a way that involves no persons crossing borders would indeed almost certainly result in a huge reduction of trade volumes. The China/Vietnam border crossing I mentioned earlier (where trucks were all disinfected and changed drivers) passed roughly 150 trucks per day. Isn't the number of trucks typically crossing the English Channel (by Chunnel or ferry) closer to 10,000 trucks per day?
DeleteAnd of course it isn't quite as problematic for a zero-Covid jurisdiction to have imperfectly-sealed land borders if those borders are with other zero-Covid jurisdictions. This is the case with the borders between China, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, or the borders between the states of Australia.
While I can't imagine China did much overland trade across its southern border anyway (seeing WWII-era aerial photos of the Burma Road shows how nasty the terrain is in this part of Asia), I wonder why China didn't have a big problem securing its northern border with Russia – a country which according to their recent admissions seems to have done just as badly Covid-wise as Western European countries?
Not sealing borders is not a problem if you believe that infections are not the problem, but deaths and serious illness are. That leads only to the requirement to isolate the vulnerable.
ReplyDeleteChina has developed its land routes to markets and sources of supply in Central Asia massively as part of the Belt and Road strategy. It has even sent large train loads of goods to Britain by land across Asia and Europe.