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Two strains. Stop spreading rumors.



I'm looking at: https://nextstrain.org/ncov What defines a strain? I know about the L/S sub-types, but there have been a great number of splits.


Exactly. Anyway, the topic is that simply getting through the infection doesn't grant immunity so one doesn't have to care about covid-19 anymore.

Plus thinking that when we have few (even if 2) variants of the virus within first 3 months there won't be any more mutations is a bit naive IMHO.


Realistically it's more than that, though. Viruses mutate rapidly and this one is into the hundreds of thousands of human transmissions now and still picking up steam. We just don't have the PCR bandwith available to sequence them as fast as they're spreading. Pretty much any direct pronouncement on the "kinds" of SARS-CoV-2 is going to be speculation, so it's all "rumors".

But strains don't correlate perfectly to immune respnse, so the upthread point about reinfection risk remains speculation. We just don't know yet. But all endemic viruses eventually reach equilibrium with the population immune response (and vaccination regime), even if it requires regular updates a-la the yearly change in flu shots.




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