Did Omicron evolve in HIV patient?
12-02-2021, 03:31 AM
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Did Omicron evolve in HIV patient?
An interesting article from NPR:
https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsan...why-it-matters
An excerpt:
"It creates this kind of cat-and-mouse game where the immune response is chasing and the virus is running," says Bedford. "And so over the course of the year, if you look in these individuals, you see, at the end of that time, generally a quite evolved virus."
Lessells is one of several researchers to have demonstrated this phenomenon by retroactively analyzing a series of samples of the coronavirus that had been taken over a period of about six months from a woman who had HIV. Through an unfortunate series of unintended mishaps in her medical care, it later transpired that she was not being properly treated for her HIV infection during that time — even as she was enrolled in a larger study for which samples were being taken of the coronavirus that she harbored.
"Because we had samples from a few different time points over that six month period," says Lessells, "we could show how the virus evolved and variants with some of the same mutations as the variants of concern appeared over time in the samples."
If this is how omicron was created, then presumably it wasn't until fairly recently that the virus finally spread into others from the person who was incubating it.
As this article points out, despite the sturm and drang directed at the unvaccinated in the US, the vast majority of those who become infected are either going to either promptly become non-contagious as they clear the infection or go on to die. The real issue is the population of immune suppressed individuals who are unable to promptly clear the virus, allowing it to replicate in their bodies for months and giving it time to acquire multiple mutations potentially increasing its infectivity. And the vast majority of people who are immune suppressed worldwide are HIV infected with the highest numbers of those individuals in some of the poorest (and least vaccinated) nations with relatively young populations.
https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsan...why-it-matters
An excerpt:
Hypothesis #3: Incubation in an immunocompromised person
There is, however, one place the virus could have been hiding while it evolved into omicron that would probably have been in health officials' blind spot: Inside the body of a single person. Specifically a person whose immune system was suppressed, for example as a result of an untreated infection with HIV. In such instances, explains Bedford, the person's immune system is still strong enough to prevent the coronavirus from killing them. But it's not strong enough to completely clear the virus. So the virus lingers inside the person for month after month, continually reproducing. With each replication there's a chance it will acquire a mutation that makes it better at evading the person's antibody-producing immune cells."It creates this kind of cat-and-mouse game where the immune response is chasing and the virus is running," says Bedford. "And so over the course of the year, if you look in these individuals, you see, at the end of that time, generally a quite evolved virus."
Lessells is one of several researchers to have demonstrated this phenomenon by retroactively analyzing a series of samples of the coronavirus that had been taken over a period of about six months from a woman who had HIV. Through an unfortunate series of unintended mishaps in her medical care, it later transpired that she was not being properly treated for her HIV infection during that time — even as she was enrolled in a larger study for which samples were being taken of the coronavirus that she harbored.
"Because we had samples from a few different time points over that six month period," says Lessells, "we could show how the virus evolved and variants with some of the same mutations as the variants of concern appeared over time in the samples."
If this is how omicron was created, then presumably it wasn't until fairly recently that the virus finally spread into others from the person who was incubating it.
12-02-2021, 03:42 AM
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Another excerpt
The larger takeaway: Ramp up HIV treatment
Regardless of the origins of omicron, Bedford and Lessells say its emergence is one more reminder that dangerous future variants could be created by the mutation of the virus in an immuno-compromised person. This is especially urgent when it comes to the literally millions of people in Southern Africa who have HIV and are not on medication. The point is not to blame or stigmatize people in this situation, they say, but rather to recognize that helping them is a key to ending the coronavirus pandemic. As Lessells puts it: "The intervention here is clear. We just need to strengthen our HIV response and get as many people as we possibly can on to effective treatment regimens."
12-02-2021, 05:16 AM
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Originally Posted by jetlaggy
Another excerpt
The larger takeaway: Ramp up HIV treatment
Regardless of the origins of omicron, Bedford and Lessells say its emergence is one more reminder that dangerous future variants could be created by the mutation of the virus in an immuno-compromised person. This is especially urgent when it comes to the literally millions of people in Southern Africa who have HIV and are not on medication. The point is not to blame or stigmatize people in this situation, they say, but rather to recognize that helping them is a key to ending the coronavirus pandemic. As Lessells puts it: "The intervention here is clear. We just need to strengthen our HIV response and get as many people as we possibly can on to effective treatment regimens."At last count, about 19% of the population of these countries is fully immunized against COVID, and they have actually been losing ground in HIV case finding and treatment.
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