Typically I thought viruses evolve to be less virulent because it’s not an evolutionary advantage to hurt your host so much that they die. That would impede a virus’ ability to reproduce and spread. So, hopefully any novel variants won’t be as deadly as the original or the delta strain.
That’s not a hard rule and there are plenty of successful viruses that are very dangerous. Bubonic plague, Smallpox, chickenpox, mumps, are rubella just a few examples. We managed to mostly eradicate them via vaccination campaigns, so people don’t remember how horrific these viruses are nowadays.
Omicron is already incredibly dangerous because there’s roughly one in six chance that you get organ damage, cognitive impairment, and chronic fatigue lasting for years. Combined with the fact that you can get reinfected, that makes it only a matter of time until you end up with a serious chronic condition.
Yeah, this thing just keeps getting worse and we’re probably going to get a bunch of new variants in the near future. Who knows what those will do.
Typically I thought viruses evolve to be less virulent because it’s not an evolutionary advantage to hurt your host so much that they die. That would impede a virus’ ability to reproduce and spread. So, hopefully any novel variants won’t be as deadly as the original or the delta strain.
That’s not a hard rule and there are plenty of successful viruses that are very dangerous. Bubonic plague, Smallpox, chickenpox, mumps, are rubella just a few examples. We managed to mostly eradicate them via vaccination campaigns, so people don’t remember how horrific these viruses are nowadays.
Omicron is already incredibly dangerous because there’s roughly one in six chance that you get organ damage, cognitive impairment, and chronic fatigue lasting for years. Combined with the fact that you can get reinfected, that makes it only a matter of time until you end up with a serious chronic condition.