mdebarkle

BA.3.2 is behaving differently than any of the other variants we've seen.

I've been wondering for some time if this is our first example of co-circulation, where only part of the population is susceptable to infection. It is starting to look stabilized in Germany, does not look like a sweep.

Here is the User Guide for ELITE, the Tool Palantir Made for ICE 404 Media is publishing a version of the user guide for ELITE, which lets ICE bring up dossiers on individual people and provides a “confidence score” of their address.

A manual for ICE's immigrant-targeting computer system, Palantir ELITE, was leaked today.

Let's look at it, then step back to evaluate how far we've come along a dangerous road and where that road might take us. 🧵

New Cryptic (North Carolina) derived from a 2020, pre-B.1.1 lineage, meaning from an infection that has lasted nearly six years.

It has one of the classic patterns of Cryptic reversions to Bat-CoV/SARS-1 spike residues: Q498Y-N501T.

Eager to see the rest of the genome.

BA.3.2 has gone from ~8% to ~44% of all sequences in Scotland over the course of December.

Larger sample sizes in a smaller nation (Scotland), unsurprisingly present a much more consistent picture in variant trends than smaller sample sizes over a much larger, more heterogeneous country (Germany).

It's a slow but persistent wave.

22 more wastewater detections of BA.3.2 (including ALL recent samples form RI). It's staring to be the dominant lineage in many cases.

I think the score on wastewater vs patient surveillance is now 44-to-1

Still more new NSP1 mutations in the BA.3.2 uploaded from the Netherlands today. We've never seen anything like this kind of rapid evolution in NSP1 (whose primary role is to shut down host-protein translation and degrade host mRNA).

I've labeled all BA.3.2-specific NSP1 muts here. 1/3

Face masks ‘inadequate’ and should be swapped for respirators, WHO is advised Experts are urging guideline changes on what health professionals should wear to protect against flu-like illnesses including Covid

www.theguardian.com/global-devel...

BA.3.2 emerged in Nov 2024 after ~3 years of intrahost evolution with >50 new spike AA muts, but since then, it's changed very little.

Could the mutagenic drug molnupiravir (MOV) galvanize BA.3.2 into pursuing new evolutionary paths? A new 89-mut BA.3.2 sequence hints that it could. 1/11

There’s an Arabic version of “every cloud has a silver lining” that translates to “no cows, no feeding them at dawn.” A Scots version is “today’s rain is tomorrow’s whisky.” And a Romanian phrase for looking on the bright side is un șut în fund, un pas înainte, or “a kick in the ass, a step forward”

Ten archaic English slang phrases…

10. Got the morbs (sad)
9. Bumpsy (drunk)
8. Whittled as a penguin (very drunk)
8. Scandal water (tea)
7. Bitch the pot (pour the tea)
5. Sauce-box (mouth)
4. Cupid’s kettle drums (breasts)
3. Dash my wig (OMG)
2. Poked up (embarrassed)
1. Not up to dick (unwell)

A French expression telling someone to mind their beeswax is occupe-toi de tes oignons. It means “deal with your own onions.”

With 30 new BA.3.2 sequences from the Netherlands and Denmark uploaded today, this is beginning to have a look of inevitability about it.

Still waiting for a recombinant that restores ORF7a, ORF7b, and ORF8 (all entirely deleted in BA.3.2).

What the U.S. Government Is Dismissing That Could Seed a Bird Flu Pandemic Egg producers suspect bird flu is traveling through the air. After a disastrous Midwestern outbreak early this year, we tested that theory and found that where the wind blew, the virus followed. Vacci...

Egg producers suspect bird flu is traveling through the air.

After a disastrous Midwestern outbreak early this year, we tested that theory and found that where the wind blew, the virus followed.

Vaccines could help, but the USDA hasn’t approved them.

One thing we've consistently seen is that if an emerging divergent variant competes evenly w/the most advanced circulating variants, it will eventually predominate. We saw this with XBB & BA.2.86, and a similar pattern holds among various minor lineages. 1/3

YouTube video by WWII US Bombers Why the 5th Air Force Ordered Japanese Convoy Survivors to be Strafed in their Lifeboats

youtu.be/ynXBEYEz5zE?...

Another US BA.3.2 wastewater detection.

This time from Bristol County, RI on Nov 11. It was about a third of the seqs.

I wonder if it was someone who flew back from Australia through SF?
@ryanhisner.bsky.social @snpoehlm.bsky.social @rajlabn.bsky.social

YouTube video by Johnny Harris How billionaires stole America's elections

youtu.be/-NuXpwB2DV4?...

YouTube video by Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell Trees Are So Weird

youtu.be/ZSch_NgZpQs?...

What the U.S. Government Is Dismissing That Could Seed a Bird Flu Pandemic Egg producers suspect bird flu is traveling through the air. After a disastrous Midwestern outbreak early this year, we tested that theory and found that where the wind blew, the virus followed. Vacci...

To combat bird flu spread, other countries have authorized poultry vaccines. The U.S. hasn’t, amid political and economic pushback.

Without a vaccine, experts say the virus poses an escalating threat: “The minute it transmits to humans, it’s done.”

By @natlash.bsky.social

Flu Overview update.

A month ago we detected flu in less than 10% of samples.

In the most recent batch over 50% had FluA (H1N1 and/or H3N2) and 75% had FluC.

Numbers were low, but flu season is starting.

Epidemiological and virological update on the emerging SARS-CoV-2 variant BA.3.2 The constant emergence of novel SARS-CoV-2 variants has driven the COVID-19 pandemic and sustains the current endemic. Saltation variants, such as BA.2.86,1 encode highly mutated spike (S) proteins th...

My work on SARS-CoV-2 variants informed a recent piece in The Lancet: "Epidemiological and virological update on the emerging SARS-CoV-2 variant BA.3.2".

The authors were kind enough to mention me and the Variant Hunters Ryan Hisner and Federico Gueli.
www.thelancet.com/journals/lan...
🧵

Fascinating 🧵. The grotesquely mutated spike of this NJ Cryptic binds ACE2 very tightly.

It raises a broader question: Can cryptic wastewater-like lineages transmit?

YES

We knew it happened once. Now we know it's happened at least twice. The results in both cases were not pretty. 1/15

BA.3.2 has been detected again in the USA.

Fascinating one. Massive increase in ACE2 binding with S:I358F according to @jbloomlab.bsky.social DMS—among the highest of any viable mutation. Seems to inhibit entry and increases vulnerability to antibodies, but with a colossal ACE2 boost like that, it could easily find other Ab-evading muts.

MBS claims the murder of Khashoggi was "a huge mistake and we're our doing our best that this doesn't happen again."

New branch spotted, it captured my attention from the first sample uploaded to Gisaid.
One GBW(US-airport surveillance) sample from Fiji Island.
With a rare mutation ( <100seqs in the pandemic) in the RBD and another a bit after the FCS region. and some interesting orf1b mutations in the tree.

Shutdown Deal Kills Rules to Prevent Food Contamination and Foodborne Illnesses The gutting of these rules coincides with a huge increase in hospitalizations and deaths from foodborne illnesses.

Congress’s shutdown deal eliminated key food safety rules, blocking agencies from enforcing measures to prevent contamination and trace outbreaks. This rollback has coincided with a surge in hospitalizations and deaths from foodborne illnesses.

COVID-19 is spreading again — how serious is it and what are the symptoms? Limited COVID-19 surveillance data are hampering vaccination and health strategies, researchers say.

Maria Van Kerkhove, interim director of the department of epidemic and pandemic management at the WHO in Geneva, Switzerland :

“ …there’s a collective amnesia right now about COVID-19”.

www.nature.com/articles/d41...

With an absent CDC and mismatched 'subclade K' flu strain, experts face upcoming season with uncertainty

www.cidrap.umn.edu/influenza-va...

YouTube video by TRYBALS Tribal People React to WHERE DID YOU SLEEP LAST NIGHT - Nirvana Unplugged

i hate the weird title to this video,
but i value the video
itself :

youtu.be/bhUeRKUsRQI?...