December 31, 2020 • 51 mins
This week in America, The UK, and in Europe record numbers of Covid-19 cases as hospitals struggle to treat the sick.
A new vaccine has been approved in The Uk, that makes 3 vaccines not including Russia and China. But, is this new variant of Covid-19 out pacing the vaccine?
We talk to two medical experts about what to expect and the dangers of this pandemic as we race to distribute vaccines.
Dr. Eric Feigl-Ding is an American public health scientist in Washington, and in Britain Dr. Paul Hunter is a professor of medicine at East Anglia Univ. and both talk at length with Back Story Host Dana Lewis in London.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
And as soon as he said that, you know, I felt,
actually felt physically sickbecause that meant that this,
you know, even with it alockdown, like if we'd continued
the November lockdown, we wouldalmost certainly have continued
to have, uh, increasing numbersof cases, increasing number of
hospitalizations and increasingnumbers of deaths.
(00:21):
And
Speaker 2 (00:22):
By the way, we are seeing those now.
Speaker 1 (00:24):
Yeah, absolutely.
Yes, yes.
Yeah.
And so it was extraordinarilyworrying.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
Hi everyone.
And welcome to another editionof backstory.
I'm Dana Lewis.
I started this podcast in thespring under lockdown, and it's
been a fantastic outlet tointerview and hear some amazing
people.
This is our last podcast of 2020we're under lockdown in London.
So I guess it ends as it startedtonight is new year's and
(00:57):
hopefully 2021 is a better yearfor everyone as we speak.
My kids will not be going backto school in London this week,
because school openings aredelayed.
Hospitals are overwhelmed hereand in America, and in other
parts of Europe, the COVID 19virus has been relentless.
And now it is adapting andbecoming more dangerous because
(01:18):
then you variant makes it spreadfaster.
We're talking about 70% faster.
According to the experts thisweek, Oxford AstraZeneca
announced they have beenapproved as a vaccine.
The third big vaccine afterPfizer's and Medina.
This one is easier to transport,cheaper to buy.
(01:38):
But as this new variant ofCOVID-19 spreading in the UK, in
Europe and Canada in the U S nowresistant to vaccines, well,
they say probably not, but wecan tell you behind the scenes
tests are being carried out atgovernment labs.
And we will know more in acouple of weeks, but we are in a
(01:59):
race say experts to get thepandemic under control with
vaccines before this virusmutates again.
And it will on this backstory,we speak to a professor of
medicine, Dr.
Paul Hunter here in the UK.
He's a virologist, but first wego to the U S and an
epidemiologist who has beenpublicly critical of the Trump
(02:21):
administration's handling of thepandemic.
There's been a lot of peoplethat have been critical, which
by the way, and by anyestimation was downplayed
politically by Trump to win anelection.
He lost the election and thevirus just keeps on coming.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
All right, joining me now from Washington is Dr.
Eric Fingal Dean, who is anepidemiologist, a health
economist, uh, he's well known.
He does a lot of television bythe way.
And, uh, Eric, you know, youappeared in this ad, um, really
against, uh, president Trumpwith a lot of other healthcare,
uh, people, doctors who werereally concerned about the pace,
(03:06):
uh, of the spread of COVID-19 inthe United States as most people
are.
Speaker 4 (03:12):
Why did you do that, ed?
Well, I felt like, um, publicpolicy around public health has
really failed in terms ofleadership in leading the
country.
And so much of what we knowabout, um, masks.
So much of what we know aboutlockdowns so much.
(03:33):
What we know about testingcontent tracing being early to
stop the pandemic.
So many public healthrecommendations were ignored.
And literally we've never beenin a situation where, um, an
election came down to life anddeath for thousands, tens of
thousands, maybe hundreds ofthousands of people as, as
(03:55):
quickly, I'm unfolding, um, thelast few months and into the
coming months.
So I felt really compelled as apublic health scientist to
really act and advocate.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
I'm glad you acted with good conscience.
And, but why do you think thatpresident Trump ignored kind of
that side of the discussion to alarge degree in downplayed the
virus constantly saying we'rerounding a corner.
The vaccines are coming, youknow, from the moment this
started breaking out in theUnited States, he, he was trying
to close the door and say, wehave it under control and it's
(04:30):
going away.
Why?
Speaker 4 (04:32):
Right.
Well, it's the key thing for hisreelection.
He thought according to a lot ofstrategists is that the economy
must be booming.
As long as the economy isbooming, that was his path to
reelection.
And obviously the coronaviruspandemic has thrown a huge
monkey wrench that given all theeconomic damage that he has
done.
(04:53):
And, and he thought early onthat, the longer, he just tried
to downplay it, ignore it.
Just trying to tell people it'sa hoax that you would somehow
dampen people's anxiety.
And again, not cause people toget worried and therefore change
your behaviors and hurt theeconomy.
Can you tell him that he couldwin in that way for his
(05:17):
reelection, but the virus, thevirus is, will do its virus
thing.
It does not care about politicalbeliefs whatsoever.
It will transmit at every singleopportunity that you get it to
transmit, whether it's airborne,whether it's not wearing masks,
whether it's not this isn't seen, whether they're not taking any
public health precautions, nottesting conduct, Tracy, this is
(05:40):
why the virus really agnosticsthe politics and that kind of
dimension a trunk, just hismindset just could not deal with
this pandemic.
Speaker 2 (05:51):
All right.
It's important timeframe in howlong this virus is led to run
loose in some regard, is it not?
Because now that enters us intothis new conversation about a
new variant, which I want to askyou about, but the longer this
virus is around the, the moreit's going to change and adapt
(06:13):
and, and become vaccineresilient.
Is it not
Speaker 4 (06:18):
Well rag vaccine resiliency, vaccine escape is a
little bit more tricky.
Uh, we don't think that thiswill escape the vaccine, but you
are right that the longer thisvirus circulates in nature, that
he has a host or reservoir ofwhether it's humans or animals
(06:39):
to replicate pass on.
And in these hosts on mutate,the longer that keeps happening,
the more and more of thesemutations, these chanced unlucky
mutations that we will see.
And so this is why we have toreally eradicate zero COVID,
shouldn't be the goal becausewith zero COVID, we can
(07:01):
eradicate it for good and returnto complete normal.
But with this semi, you know, uh, lockdown semi, uh, keep the
embers, as long as it's almostgone, you know, that's half
Willy nilly approach or not endthis virus and will allow it to
become endemic for longterm andmutates more and more forms.
(07:24):
And we just cannot afford that
Speaker 2 (07:26):
Here in the United Kingdom, but also where you are
in the United States, that doesappear to be the pro the
approach though, as long as thehospitals can deal with the
inflow of patients, then youkind of release some of the
restrictions, let businessesopen again and movie theaters
and Cylons, and then the momentit looks like they're about to
(07:47):
be overwhelmed.
Again, they start locking downand that's what we're, we're
experiencing here in London, uh,because of this new development
with the virus, they are lockingdown and starting to get pretty
panicked, but they're nevergoing for what you talk about
this kind of zero approach tothe virus.
Speaker 4 (08:06):
Yeah.
My best analogy is, look, if youare owner with Jurassic park and
you know, you've almosteliminated all the velociraptors
, um, but welcome to the park.
Kids come to the park.
No one's gonna come to the parkand same with, if it was a zoo,
the full economic demand andmarginal propensity to consume,
(08:27):
and all of these things,economics, you will not return
until you have completelyeliminated that spiral.
This virus is just thatpernicious, uh, just that easy
way to, um, basically transmitthat it will really stall out
our economic development in somany different ways and hurt our
(08:49):
children in so many ways.
So a little bit of the vaccinestrategy, which I cannot, you
know, emphasize is so important,but isn't coming fast enough for
given the pace of inoculationszero COVID should be the goal
and really, truly stamp it out.
So that's never a menace to us.
Again, you really have to aimfor that.
(09:11):
And with the hospital criteria,it's so dumb.
Look, if that was the criteriafor everything, you know what?
You don't need to wear helmets,a hospital beds they're not
full, you don't need, uh, youknow, seatbelt laws or hospital
beds are not full.
That's not how public healthworks.
You reduce risk every single wayyou can.
(09:32):
And this is the friends of thesame reason.
Um, I think secondhand smoke isit is a good analogy.
Second hand smoke, extra hurtsand causes cancer and heart
disease and deaths and otherpeople, right?
That's why it's bandedrestaurants and bars and this,
and this hurting other people.
This, we have to take thisprevention model and the
community model truly we needto, in order to in guarantee
(09:56):
economic development, we need tostop this virus for good.
And we need to think of thecollective good and not just
think of, Oh, are the hospitalbeds full?
We're not really.
We really have to focus on zeroCOVID as the goal.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
How concerned are you about this new variant that
they've traced back to at leaststarting here in the United
Kingdom, especially in the SouthEast and around London, where I
am to September, they think, um,and it has quote unquote by the
government taken off.
How concerned are you?
Is this just another variant insome 4,000 variants?
(10:34):
Or would you say, no, this is alot more significant.
Speaker 4 (10:38):
Yeah, we've had a lot of variants, but this is
significant given that thenumber of mutations is
accumulated is huge.
It's like a huge jump step upfrom the average rate of
mutation.
And it's in the spike proteinand in the binding domains,
which means it can likely modifyhow this virus functions and
(11:01):
this increased transmissibilityanywhere between 50 and 70% is
worrisome.
That said it doesn't change howwe, our public guidelines are.
We know how to stop this virus.
It's basically wear masks, takedistance precautions, but that's
not enough to take airborneprecautions because this is the
(11:22):
airborne virus and henceventilate and do all these, uh,
contesting contracts racing.
All of these things don'tchange.
These strategies still work.
The problem is this virus justmove so much faster.
If these public healthcontainment measures are not in
place and no one wants to lockdown, I don't want to lock down.
(11:43):
No one wants to lock down.
That's a last resort, but unlesswe can do all these proper
public health things, lockdownis the only way to go.
And obviously that hurts all alot of people.
So it doesn't change in apercent, uh, what we should be
doing, that it just changes theurgency.
And I think the increased riskof transmission in children,
(12:05):
that speculation also increasesthe urgency that if we want our
kids to go back to school in thenear future, we really have to
get this under control.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
All right.
That's what I want to ask youabout, because up until now,
it's been gauged here in anotherparts of the United States that
it's more important to keepschools open than it is to keep
kids away from COVID becausethey don't generally get a lot
of big reactions to it or, orthey're they're asymptomatic.
(12:35):
Uh, but no doubt it is spreadingamongst kids.
And this new variant appears tobe based on initial reports.
And I understand studies arestill going on and you're
you're, you don't have firsthandstudies, uh, in front of you
right now, but what do youthink, how do you interpret that
data that you're starting to seeabout its ability to spread with
(12:55):
kids?
And what does that mean to, toschool openings, which are just
around the corner,
Speaker 4 (13:01):
Right?
And I think this is one of thefactors that really worries me
because this transmissibilitypeople have downplayed it in
children for the longest time.
Now, granted children don't dieat a high rate, but they do get
sick and do get hospitalized.
And some have, of course,unfortunately do die, but this
(13:21):
is only more important for ourkids, because if it is true, if
it is preliminary, data is truethat this elevates the
transmission risk among kids tothe level of Advil, which is
what they're speculating.
This means that children areefficient vectors as adults.
And that means schools willbecome much more dangerous of a
(13:44):
place.
Now, obviously of all the thingsto open, the last things to
close down should be schools.
And so I would rather close downbars and restaurants before it
closed schools, but this reallychanged the ball game around
schools.
And this emphasizes thatstopping the virus, ultimately
(14:05):
stopping the virus throughvaccinations or through these
other public health containermeasures, Texas tech testing
conduct, raising massventilation, airport
precautions.
It just takes on a level ofurgency.
I cannot emphasize enough andpeople are just also ignoring
(14:25):
the fact that it's airborne thiswash.
Your hands is important in theearly days, but I think wash
your hands.
It's still important, but notnearly as important as ventilate
and not nearly as important asyou know, um, using, um,
advanced Merv 13 filtersgermicidal UV for, for, for
(14:47):
office buildings and, um, newerschools, all these things take
on a new level of urgency,unfortunately.
And if so, if this variant holdsout true, which is now detected
in like dozens of countriesworldwide, it is very worrisome
for our kids going back toschool
Speaker 2 (15:05):
More widespread than we realize because, Oh, Kay's
very, very good at analyzinglike a hundred times better at,
at doing genome sequencing and,and studying the development of
the, of the virus.
Do you think that there's just alot of other countries that just
haven't recognized howwidespread this is already in
their populations?
Speaker 4 (15:27):
Yeah, absolutely.
And remember the old adage, notesting, no cases, no pandemic.
Well in this, uh, situation,it's no genomic sequencing new,
no mutations, no new variants.
It's, it's this.
And it's a very backwards, youknow, see, you know, you will
hear no evil, but is there atruly evil, um, we don't know.
(15:49):
And the us is ranked number 43in the world in terms of
percentage of total casessequenced the virus.
Okay.
The sequence.
So we're really behind the ballgame here and we think it could
already be behind.
Remember in the spring, we haddiscovered that we were two
months behind identification ofthe early Washington state cases
(16:13):
because we didn't, we lackinglacking testing and you know,
January, February.
So this is the worry that it'salready here.
It's already circulating.
Now it's not more deadly or, um,you know, virulent than the
previous drains.
But again, what's what makesthis fire so unique is that it
(16:36):
doesn't kill everyone reallyquickly.
Because if you do like a Bolawith 50% mortality, this fires
wouldn't take over the world.
It spreads pernicious Lilly,heart kills a lot of people, but
also harmlessly passes throughmany.
And this bad things are manybecause of is contagious.
This is what gives it thepernicious property to take on
(16:59):
the world as a pandemic.
So we have to stop it and wehave to take a whole, no
prisoner, zero a zero COVIDbecause those countries that
have New Zealand, Taiwan,Australia, China, and Vietnam,
they've enjoyed hundreds of daysof no community transmissions or
(17:19):
for the most part and all and nodeaths.
And they're having concertssports games do it.
Life is basically returned tonormal and they have not paid
any further price beyond theinitial lockdown period, but we
are constantly paying it againand again, with multi-trillion
dollar relief bills that wecan't afford on the longterm, we
(17:43):
have to do it and we have tostop it.
Now,
Speaker 2 (17:46):
Editorial in the garden by an Anthony.
Who's a professor of globalhealth and sustainable
development at universitycollege here in London, um, says
don't blame the new developmentwith the virus for where we are.
He says the prime minister'srepeated dithering delays and
seeming inability to makeunpopular decisions have led
(18:08):
Britain to one of the worstdeath rates in the world.
We can only hope that we're notin that position by Easter.
He says, there's a lot ofparallels between what's
happened in Britain and what hashappened under president Trump.
Speaker 4 (18:20):
Yeah, absolutely.
And I agree the most of theglobal cases, hospitalizations
and deaths are not due to thenew, very new, very is still a
small minority of the totalviruses that circulating.
And you know, it really is ashow of how big the difference
(18:41):
good leadership makes.
Um, in New Zealand, just Cindaart and Shirley leadership
allowed to huge move fast andtake the precautionary
principle.
Taiwan did the same thing aswell.
Um, Taiwan's vice-president isactually a Johns Hopkins trained
epidemiologist.
(19:01):
They move fast.
They, you know, they do blinkwhen it came to, uh, how bad
this could be.
They knew that they had to getunder control and that takes
leadership decisiveness.
If you want to be sure, 100%sure before you act, you will be
too late as a who immersionsdirector.
(19:23):
Mike Ryan said, this is why goodleadership in these times of
crisis makes all the difference.
This is not like a hurricanethat's already blown through.
This is an active storm.
That's still raging and thefaster you can stop it, the
faster you can enjoy life again.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
Last question to you, what is the risk?
And I don't want to overdramatize it, but it seems to me
in everything that I've read,that you've already talked
about, the new variant changing,somewhat the development of the
spike protein, which is what thevaccines are designed to cling
(20:02):
on to an attack.
If we did there to use somebodyelse's words again, if this goes
on with us, just kind of lettingthe steam out of the lockdowns
and then locking down a bit moreand then letting it run again,
run hot.
Isn't there a danger that thesevaccines that we need so badly
(20:23):
at a certain point will getoutpaced by COVID-19, which is
constantly adapting to itsenvironment.
Speaker 4 (20:33):
Yeah, it's this, this coronavirus, it's not as fast
mutating as say the flu, but itdoes mutate over time.
And the longer we let it linger,especially for many, many years
there be vaccine escape.
To some degree, it won't be, youknow, right now say maternal
adviser, a 95% efficacy.
(20:54):
It won't be that it drops tozero, but it could drop a
significant percentages.
The more mutations it has now,we're doing lab studies right
now to show how much, um, the,our antibodies, the resistance
that we develop from thisvaccine will, uh, attack this
new variant.
(21:15):
And some people say probablywon't affect much at most, a few
percentage points dropped, butthe longer we let it roam free,
the more it will pick up theseresistance.
And I use the word resistancebecause it's slightly not
exactly the slightly akin toantibiotic resistance, right?
The, you use more ways to attackit.
(21:38):
Especially certain drugs likemonoclonal antibodies, which
people speculate it could be useof the monoclonal antibodies in
the immunocompromised person,but the more you attack the
virus, the more it will try andways to beach and the more time
and more bodies in which you canlive for a while to mutate the
(21:58):
more, the greater, the risk thatthis could happen.
And that is what we ultimatelydon't want.
Now, granted, we can modify theMRD vaccines pretty quickly.
We had this vaccine, we areadministering now back in
February, we can synthesizepretty fast, but the trials
would take so long and take somuch effort and time, and we
(22:20):
will lose a lot of cases.
And we'll go through more ofthese openings.
Lockdowns at the pandemic is notcontrol.
We have to stop it now.
And the fact scene thing, youknow, it's a more of a
multi-year thing.
If it becomes a significantvaccine escape, but that should
not be a consideration right nowconsideration right now is we
(22:41):
have to stop it for a wholecollective of public health,
children's educational andeconomic reasons.
And long-term, if we do not stopit in 2021, 2022, we let it keep
roaming.
Then the vaccine escape willreally catch up with us in a few
years.
And that's what we ultimatelydefinitely want to avoid as
(23:01):
well.
Speaker 2 (23:02):
All right, Dr.
Eric, figgle ding.
Very good to talk to you and, uh, an epidemiologist and health
economist, and I will confess,I've been trying to get him for
more than a week.
He's he's a busy guy and in highdemand.
So we really appreciate yourtime.
Speaker 4 (23:17):
Thank you.
Best wishes.
Thank you, sir.
Speaker 2 (23:27):
All right, let's go to Norritch.
Um, England in East Anglia, theNorth school of medicine, uh, is
at the university of East Angliaand Dr.
Paul Hunter, uh, is a professorin medicine.
Hi, Paul.
Hello.
Good afternoon.
You are a virologist.
Yeah, my medical specialty.
Speaker 1 (23:46):
I graduated in medicine, then I specialized in
medical, microbiology andvirology, but a lot of my, uh,
career has been, um, are alsoinvolved in, uh, public health
aspects of infectious disease.
Speaker 2 (23:59):
You probably never thought we would be in this
situation.
Speaker 1 (24:04):
Um, well actually one of our medical students, Amanda,
my old medical students, uh,sent me an email a couple of
months back saying he canremember a lecture that I gave
about 10, 15 years ago now whereI was predicting pretty much
that we would have somethinglike this at some time in there
in, uh, um, uh, uh, workingcareer.
(24:26):
So, uh, it's one thing topredict the one was expecting.
Speaker 2 (24:30):
I think that predicted it's quite another one
to face it.
And I mean, actually, did youreally believe that when you
kind of looked statistically andsaid, yeah, well, I mean, we're
probably do every century orsomething.
Yeah,
Speaker 1 (24:40):
No, absolutely.
Because, um, you know, we, formost of my professional career,
we've been experiencing one ortwo what's called emerging
infectious disease threats ayear.
And it was only really a matterof time before we had a big one
like this.
I mean, we've had in the lastfew years, we've had, um, Ebola
(25:04):
in West Africa, Zika virus inSouth America, uh, avian,
influenza, swine flu, all sortsof other threats, SARS and MERS.
And so they, they come aboutonce one or two a year on
average.
And it was only a matter of timebefore we had one as big as
this.
And as the world healthorganization, um, said a couple
(25:28):
of days ago, you know, thismight not actually be the big
one where they're full of goodnews.
Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (25:37):
So it may not actually be the big one because
they're expecting somethingthat's much stronger than this
virus.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
Well, be the case.
I mean, we're heading for about2 million deaths totally so far.
Um, with this pandemic and, um,Spanish flu, there was, I think
I'm writing saying there wassomething like 50 million deaths
worldwide and, um, it it's, uh,possibly only a matter of time
(26:03):
before we gain, we havesomething that can do offs this,
but hopefully
Speaker 2 (26:09):
Like we, we seem so utterly ill prepared for all of
it.
Look, as we speak, let's startoff on a positive app.
Oxford AstraZeneca has announcednow that their vaccine has been
approved.
So we have yet another bigvaccine out of the, I guess, out
of three big ones now, um, wouldyou take it, do you think this
(26:29):
is great news or
Speaker 1 (26:33):
I think it is, I think the, um, they're the three
main vaccines at the moment and,uh, for the West at least, but
there are others, there's theRussian Sputnik vaccine and
China's got it.
Seven vaccine, um, which is, um,again is slightly different to,
uh, the, so the, uh, Emma RNAvaccines for Pfizer Medina and
(26:54):
the add no virus vector vaccine,
Speaker 2 (26:58):
This one different than the Pfizer and the Madonna
Speaker 1 (27:01):
It's it's, it's delivered within a preexisting
virus, which is for the Oxfordone, it's a chimpanzee virus and
that gets into the cells andthen the DNA is released.
And then the, um, uh, then thatcell manufacturers that spike
protein, which is what you'retrying to gender the, um,
(27:23):
immunity to, um, the Pfizer andMedina vaccine.
So it's called MRN a vaccine.
So essentially what you're doingis injecting messenger RNA into,
um, uh, uh, little packages thatthen get taken up and then get
replicated into, into theprotein.
(27:44):
And so ultimately the end, theend result is, is, is the same,
but they, uh, they, there aremany different, um, issues in
how you handle these differentvaccines.
Certainly.
Speaker 2 (27:57):
I don't know many mainstream people that don't
have concerns about the safetyof the vaccines, even
traditional people thatgenerally say, yeah, you know,
vaccines are fine.
They give them to their kids.
These have been rolled out soquickly in such a compressed
period of time.
I mean, there, there are still alot of concerns with some pretty
sober people.
I mean, these are notanti-vaxxers, but just generally
(28:18):
people who are worried about,you know, do you take it or do
you wait awhile?
Speaker 1 (28:22):
Yeah.
I mean, I, I, I've got nohesitation, you know, I'm just
desperately looking to theopportunity to have my shots,
which the last time I lookedmight not be till April may.
Um, although with the Oxfordvaccine coming out, I think
that, I mean, this issue aboutthe speed is, is that these have
(28:42):
got to effectively got tomarket.
Um, when you realize what thereasons for the delays are
normally, then it becomes, um,less frightening.
The, the issue with mostvaccines is that when you're
developing a new vaccine, so anydisease, the first thing is you
(29:03):
never sure it's going to work.
So what happens is that youpersuade somebody to fund your
initial research, to show thatyou can develop a vaccine and
that may be, and then go on toshow that it works possibly an
animal experiments.
And, um, and then once you'vegot those, you write those up
(29:25):
and you then go through anotherround of persuading, somebody to
fund the phase one studies, uh,which if they're successful, you
fund the second phase twostudies.
And, and the other thing is thatfor most, uh, infectious
diseases that you're trying todevelop, uh, vaccines to you
don't have actually that muchdisease around.
(29:46):
So the, even when you do get tophase three trials, it takes a
long time to accumulate enoughcases in your study for you to
be able to judge the efficacy ofthe vaccine what's happened here
is that effectively all thesemanufacturers, all these vaccine
(30:06):
producers were funded up frontfor the whole thing.
They, um, so they didn't, oncethey'd completed the phase one
studies, they could, they didn'tthen have to go begging for
money to do the next bit.
And also because of, uh, thatthey were able to, um, overlap
(30:30):
the different studies.
So that as soon as you've gotpreliminary data, showing that
phase, once it's safe, you canthen, uh, pretty much quickly go
onto the phase two studies andso on.
So, so all the steps have beengone through,
Speaker 2 (30:45):
Right, in saying that with the Oxford AstraZeneca and
maybe with the others too, thatbecause we're in the middle of a
pandemic and especially in theUnited Kingdom where you have a
national healthcare system.
Yes, they were, they were veryquick in getting it out to
people, having the right people,take it for their studies and
being able to get those resultsback.
Speaker 1 (31:06):
Yeah.
And, and importantly, havingthose right people actually get
sick.
Um, and you, because, you know,you only know that the vaccine
has worked once people startgetting sick in your study.
And then what happens is theonce you've got enough people
who have actually developed thedisease, you break the code and
(31:27):
see whether or not the peoplewho've developed the disease
have been in, have had thevaccine or a placebo.
And, um, and that's why thatphase three studies, which
typically can take several yearsto complete, have been, um, able
to got big gut through quitequickly,
Speaker 2 (31:49):
As we speak, there are a lot of people sick and
there are numbers of people sickin America, sick in Europe,
United Kingdom, um, very closeto leading the death toll in
Europe, again, um, this newvariant and pull it's really
what I wanted to talk to youabout.
Are you alarmed by the newvariant?
Speaker 1 (32:10):
Oh, desperately.
So, um, I can remember one of,one of the days that I will
remember most about the epidemicwas, uh, in part because it
shocked me and I wasn'texpecting it was when the prime
minister gave his, uh, his, um,presentation about a week a
(32:39):
Saturday.
What was, it was about a weekbefore Christmas about this,
Speaker 2 (32:43):
You know, it's not very long ago.
It seems in this news cycle, itseems like it was a long time
ago.
It was just a week beforeChristmas.
And that was 72 hours after hehad come out and said it would
be inhuman, just create alockdown through Christmas.
Speaker 1 (32:58):
Absolutely.
And, um, and th what he said wasthat the second sentence was
effectively that as far as theycan tell, the new variant has an
R value of more than 0.4 overthe pre-existing variants.
(33:21):
Now we've, um, we we're hopingto publish this soon, but we've,
we've been looking at howeffective the Nash, the November
lockdown was.
And generally it was prettyeffective.
It must be said, you know, interms of suppressing the virus,
um, and most regions were ableto get down on average to about
(33:43):
an R value of 0.7, um, in forthat, for their epidemics.
Speaker 2 (33:50):
You know, Paul, there's a lot of people that
don't understand the R value,especially in America, because
it's talked about in newsconferences here all the time,
but the R value essentially asif it's an R value of one, that
means you infect one otherperson.
If it's one and a half, you'reinspecting, you're bending
silent half, you're passing iton.
So it's gotta be below one.
Speaker 1 (34:08):
It's got to be below one now.
So the simple maths was, if ourNovember lockdown was able to
get the existing variants downto an R value of 0.7, and this
new variant was 0.4, that takesabove one.
And so what, what essentiallythat said was that the, that the
(34:32):
November lockdown was notsufficient to reverse the
increase in this new variant,which is very scary.
And that means that, you know,we, um, and as soon as he said
that, you know, I felt, actuallyfelt physically sick because
that meant that this, you know,even with it, uh, locked down,
(34:56):
like if we'd continued theNovember lockdown, we would
almost certainly have continuedto have, uh, increasing numbers
of cases, increasing number ofhospitalizations and increasing
numbers of deaths.
Speaker 2 (35:08):
And by the way, we are seeing those now.
Speaker 1 (35:10):
Yeah, absolutely.
Yes, yes.
Yeah.
And so it was extraordinarilyworrying.
It means cause we tend to usethe term non-pharmaceutical
interventions and although for,for these, and they'll they lock
downs is, um, it's a sort of acatch-all phrase.
The reality is that lockdown isa very, you know, means very
(35:33):
different things.
You know, it can be just aPope's restaurants are closed,
shops are closed or it could be,everybody has to stay at home.
It could mean, you know, andthere's a difference between
lockdowns with schools open anddown,
Speaker 2 (35:48):
We're in London and we're in a, we're in a tier four
lockdown, which means beautysalons, gyms, all of the main
shopping centers, which wereopen just before Christmas had
to be closed, but you can stillgo to work.
You can still, uh, travel onpublic transit.
They say, if you need to, butmost people who want money will
(36:10):
say that they need to indeed.
Um, so it's it's, and you're notallowed to socialize with other
households that shut all of thatChristmas three household mixing
idea that just shut it all down.
Do you think that is workingnow?
Speaker 1 (36:27):
Yeah.
And that, that was depressingbecause actually, although a lot
of my colleagues were arguingagainst having celebrations over
Christmas.
I was not one of them because Ifelt that we could, I felt the
three, uh, family Christmas, uh,rule could have allowed us to
(36:48):
manage Christmas safely, uh, andless of a risk than actually
going about our normal dailylife, uh, early on in the month.
But this new variant of course,just, yeah, I mean, it just, uh,
throw out,
Speaker 2 (37:05):
Do you alarm that beyond the R the replication
number?
Speaker 1 (37:10):
If we can't stop this disease, if whatever we do
shorter vaccination increased.
Well, there's a number ofthings.
The first is that forgettingabout vaccination at the moment,
what this means is that casenumbers will increase, um,
rapidly, no matter, uh, possiblyno matter how strict our
(37:33):
lockdowns are.
And of course you can't lockdowns, can't be ever totally
strict.
I mean, if we were able toenforce a rule that said, okay,
for the next month, nobody atall is allowed to leave their
house.
Then, uh, the virus would prettymuch have disappeared and may
(37:55):
well have actually totallydisappeared.
The problem is that there'd be alot of people dead from
starvation and the watersupplies would have stopped
working and, and our electricitywouldn't be on and all these
other things, which we need tokeep us alive.
So it's, it's always has to be abalance between how restrictive
(38:16):
you, you want to be.
And actually, how do you keeppeople, keep society going, um,
at the lockdown and seems to me
Speaker 2 (38:26):
What balance it seems to me watching this government
in Britain, and then alsowatching the, the Trump.
I don't even want tocharacterize it, but I mean, the
Trump tragic tragic comedy, um,that there's, there was this
idea of herd immunity in thebeginning.
And then they started to kind ofget into this other system
(38:47):
where, you know, they would,they would lift the lid, um,
just until hospitals started tosee those increase numbers.
And they were worried about thehospitals getting overwhelmed,
and then they would put it down.
Whereas in Asia, the philosophywas very much shut it down,
eliminate it, and then reopened.
And, and in Western Europe andin America, um, Canada was a bit
(39:12):
better where I'm from generallythough it was, you know, let it,
let it simmer.
Speaker 1 (39:18):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And I think that was a mistake.
And I think, I think the, um, wecertainly didn't in this country
do well enough to control thisepidemic.
And I think the, the fact thatwe, that the new variant arose
in the UK, there is nothingspecial about where new variants
(39:40):
can arise.
But the only thing that driveswhether or not you're going to
get a new variant in one placeor another is how much more
disease you've got in one placeor another, you know, the
likelihood of getting a newvariant appearing in a place is
solely related to the number ofinfections.
(40:01):
So if we'd managed to bring ourinfections lower during the
summer and September, if we'dgot an effective test track and
trace that actually workedproperly, if we, um, uh, being a
little bit more cautious aboutopening up some of the
hospitality venues andencouraging people to go on, um,
(40:24):
uh, to go to restaurants duringAugust on particular days,
because that's when you've gotthe half price meal.
And that's when it was reallybusy, um, that, um, you know, we
might not have actually hadenough cases around to have
actually kick-started theEnglish barrier, but then of
course the, you know, there'sthe South African variants.
(40:47):
So, you know, it wouldn'tnecessarily
Speaker 2 (40:49):
Very, very quickly.
Just two more questions.
One is, you said the Englishvariant look, I was looking at
the center for strategic risksin America.
Um, and there, there are a lotof former defense officials and
people who have died who havedealt with the risk of
biological warfare.
And I have a lot of respect forthem, but they talked about the
(41:13):
genome sequencing sequencingthat takes place in the United
Kingdom.
Um, and that there really isn'tanything comparable to in other
places and that the us shouldhave it, but that the number
that they use in the UnitedStates 0.3% of cases have been
sequenced in the United Kingdom.
It's about five, 10% roughly,right?
(41:35):
Yes.
The us is ranked 43 in theworld, by the way, which I think
is shocking.
So look that may tell us, yeah,the UK is better at sequencing.
Doesn't it also tell us thatthis variant, while it's really
been identified in the UnitedKingdom and people are sealing
their borders to the UK, it isprobably much more widespread
than we realize.
Speaker 1 (41:55):
Yeah, it is now.
But I think, I think the balanceof evidence is it probably
started initially in theSoutheast of England, maybe
Kent, but, you know, we can'tsay that for certain, you know,
one of the things, as I'm sureyou know about Kent is that it's
sort of quite close to thechannel tunnel.
(42:16):
And so, you know, a lot of them,
Speaker 2 (42:18):
All the truck drivers passing through and stuff,
Speaker 1 (42:22):
Well, you can't exclude that, but it did, you
know, um, but, uh, it, itcertainly is spreading more
widely.
Um, it, it's now in the States,it's now in Canada, it's in
Australia and it's, uh, itpretty in print, I think most
European countries where they'veactually looked for it.
Speaker 2 (42:44):
Do you, in your initial reaction, which you
described as feeling physicallyill when you saw the increasing
our rates, um, and realize thisnew VR variant, uh, had taken
off, do you believe that, um, weare battling the clock in that
(43:06):
this variant, it is just amatter of time because we're
seeing mutations in the spikeprotein, which it attaches the
vaccines attach onto.
If we don't roll out vaccineseffectively, if this is not
handled quickly and the lid putback on all of this, that the
virus is simply going to outpaceand I'm smart than you vaccines,
Speaker 1 (43:30):
You're quite right.
I mean, at the moment, there isno evidence that it's made a big
change to the ability of thevaccine to protect against that
strain.
The big problem though, is thatwe do, we S um, uh, I I've been
saying this for some time andprobably one of the few people
(43:52):
in the UK that is actually, uh,quoted as saying this for some
time.
But, um, I was gratified to knowthat the chief scientist of the
world health organization twodays ago said exactly the same
thing.
We do not know whether any ofthe current vaccines actually
stop infection.
(44:12):
So, um, it is certainlyplausible that the vaccines and
I think the, um, there is, uh, Ithink the Oxford AstraZeneca
vaccine have actually looked atthis and the thought does it
didn't actually make that muchdifference to whether somebody
an infection or not.
(44:34):
But what it does is stop peopleor reduce the chances of people
developing things symptomatic
Speaker 2 (44:40):
Right now.
No, I'm alarmed now I'm alone,because what you're telling me
is if it doesn't stop infectionyeah, lets you continue on.
But that means all of the socialdistancing, all of the mask
wearing all of that is going tohave to continue because this
vaccine will continue tocirculate and continue to mutate
and develop.
And eventually
Speaker 1 (45:00):
It's quite plausible.
Yeah.
And it may well be the case thatalthough at the moment that the
spike proteins is still, uh, uh,uh, close enough for the vaccine
to work, um, at some point,presumably it's quite possible
that we will get some nutationthat is, uh, that's the called
(45:20):
escape mutants that, that nolonger is controlled by the
vaccine, but it shouldn't bethat we weren't have to go
through the huge process thatwe've had to this year to, to
modify the vaccines for any newmutation.
But the issue is in people whodon't have vaccine, if it does,
(45:40):
if these vaccines don't stoptransmission, although they'll
almost certainly reduce theprobability of transmission,
even if they don't stop, stopit, but if they don't stop it,
then any concept of herdimmunity from vaccination, just
evaporates, you know, and, um,so that people who elect not to
(46:03):
be vaccinated for whateverreason or can't because of
preexisting disease or whatever,um, they're still very much at
risk of getting the infection ofgetting severe disease and, and,
and dying depending on otherrisk factors and their age and
so on.
So yeah, it is.
(46:24):
And, and I think with this, um,more infectious, um, variant
that becomes even more difficultfor people who don't have the
vaccine, they're even more atrisk of continuing to be getting
the infection.
So I think to be honest, Ican't, you know, I, well, I've
(46:48):
been saying for months that, youknow, I can see my
grandchildren's grandchildren,well, I won't be around then,
but you know, I, I stronglysuspect that my grandchildren's
grandchildren will still begetting infections with
COVID-19, but they almostcertainly will not be dying by
then.
And almost certainly the diseasethat we S that they would
(47:10):
experience, won't be that muchdifferent from the common cold.
And that is, and I'm saying thatbecause we know that's happened
at least twice in the past,where a very similar to virus
virus to COVID-19 has got intohuman society probably was
responsible for large of deathsfor the few years.
(47:31):
And then after that, it justsort of, we came to a, um, um,
uh, a, a situation where it wasjust the common cold bond,
Speaker 2 (47:41):
But you're saying there's still some very
difficult years potentiallyahead of us, even though the UK
health minister was ontelevision this morning, saying
this is all going to be over inthe spring.
I mean, he is that's, I thinkthat is in the extreme.
Speaker 1 (47:56):
I think that is overly optimistic personally.
I, it, I think the things willbe a lot better by the spring.
Don't get me wrong, you know, bythe time we're into the spring
and people who, um, are wantingare accepting of the vaccine of
the vaccine that is going tomake a huge difference.
(48:17):
And I can't see next summerbeing anywhere near as difficult
as this last year.
And I, you know, um, uh, the,um, I quite personally, I
totally expecting to be able totravel and go to meetings, um,
come next summer and Septemberagain.
Speaker 2 (48:38):
You're right.
I hope you're right.
And I, uh, I'm watchingpresident elect Biden criticize
the Trump rollout of the vaccinebecause this is a race against
time saying the way it's going.
It will take years not months.
The UK government seems poisedand they have promised a speedy,
efficient rollout, but they havebungled everything, uh, up until
(49:00):
now.
So
Speaker 1 (49:01):
White
Speaker 2 (49:04):
Dr.
Paul Hunter, a professor ofmedicine at the Norwich school
of medicine, university of EastAnglia.
Great to talk to you, Paul.
Thank you so much.
Bye pleasure.
Speaker 3 (49:13):
That's our backstory, the last edition of 2020.
We wish you, well, pleasesubscribe to backstory.
I've now launched a newnewsletter to help you digest
and navigate the daily news,because I think a lot of people
and people tell me they don'tknow how to read daily news and
watch television and figure outwhat's true.
(49:33):
And what's disinformation.
Check it out.
Dana Lewis's backstorynewsletter on sub stock.
I'll try to explain news andgive you an idea how I source
it.
And I'll even put the linksthere in 2021.
I'll continue to bring youweekly podcasts focusing on
international news.
Here's what the astrologers sayabout 2020.
(49:57):
It was a cataclysmic aligning ofplanets that ends in the new
year.
Thank goodness.
And 2021 ushers in the age ofAquarius, what changes are
astrologists predicting in 2021?
If this year saw our regularways of life up ended, then next
year is tipped to offertechnological advancements and
the mending of communities theysay on December the 21st, 20, 20
(50:21):
Jupiter and Saturn met inAquarius.
And they'll remain in this signfor the majority of year.
Aquarius is a sign associatedwith abrupt change, forming
communities fighting for causesthat you care about and making
technological advances.
Anyway, that's what a strolleryou're saying.
And I think I'll take any goodnews at this point.
(50:43):
Thanks for listening tobackstory on Dana Lewis and
London.
And I'll talk to you again soon.
On the other side in 2021,
Speaker 5 (51:56):
[inaudible].
And as soon as he said that, you know, I felt,
actually felt physically sickbecause that meant that this,
you know, even with it alockdown, like if we'd continued
the November lockdown, we wouldalmost certainly have continued
to have, uh, increasing numbersof cases, increasing number of
hospitalizations and increasingnumbers of deaths.
(00:21):
And
Speaker 2 (00:22):
By the way, we are seeing those now.
Speaker 1 (00:24):
Yeah, absolutely.
Yes, yes.
Yeah.
And so it was extraordinarilyworrying.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
Hi everyone.
And welcome to another editionof backstory.
I'm Dana Lewis.
I started this podcast in thespring under lockdown, and it's
been a fantastic outlet tointerview and hear some amazing
people.
This is our last podcast of 2020we're under lockdown in London.
So I guess it ends as it startedtonight is new year's and
(00:57):
hopefully 2021 is a better yearfor everyone as we speak.
My kids will not be going backto school in London this week,
because school openings aredelayed.
Hospitals are overwhelmed hereand in America, and in other
parts of Europe, the COVID 19virus has been relentless.
And now it is adapting andbecoming more dangerous because
(01:18):
then you variant makes it spreadfaster.
We're talking about 70% faster.
According to the experts thisweek, Oxford AstraZeneca
announced they have beenapproved as a vaccine.
The third big vaccine afterPfizer's and Medina.
This one is easier to transport,cheaper to buy.
(01:38):
But as this new variant ofCOVID-19 spreading in the UK, in
Europe and Canada in the U S nowresistant to vaccines, well,
they say probably not, but wecan tell you behind the scenes
tests are being carried out atgovernment labs.
And we will know more in acouple of weeks, but we are in a
(01:59):
race say experts to get thepandemic under control with
vaccines before this virusmutates again.
And it will on this backstory,we speak to a professor of
medicine, Dr.
Paul Hunter here in the UK.
He's a virologist, but first wego to the U S and an
epidemiologist who has beenpublicly critical of the Trump
(02:21):
administration's handling of thepandemic.
There's been a lot of peoplethat have been critical, which
by the way, and by anyestimation was downplayed
politically by Trump to win anelection.
He lost the election and thevirus just keeps on coming.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
All right, joining me now from Washington is Dr.
Eric Fingal Dean, who is anepidemiologist, a health
economist, uh, he's well known.
He does a lot of television bythe way.
And, uh, Eric, you know, youappeared in this ad, um, really
against, uh, president Trumpwith a lot of other healthcare,
uh, people, doctors who werereally concerned about the pace,
(03:06):
uh, of the spread of COVID-19 inthe United States as most people
are.
Speaker 4 (03:12):
Why did you do that, ed?
Well, I felt like, um, publicpolicy around public health has
really failed in terms ofleadership in leading the
country.
And so much of what we knowabout, um, masks.
So much of what we know aboutlockdowns so much.
(03:33):
What we know about testingcontent tracing being early to
stop the pandemic.
So many public healthrecommendations were ignored.
And literally we've never beenin a situation where, um, an
election came down to life anddeath for thousands, tens of
thousands, maybe hundreds ofthousands of people as, as
(03:55):
quickly, I'm unfolding, um, thelast few months and into the
coming months.
So I felt really compelled as apublic health scientist to
really act and advocate.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
I'm glad you acted with good conscience.
And, but why do you think thatpresident Trump ignored kind of
that side of the discussion to alarge degree in downplayed the
virus constantly saying we'rerounding a corner.
The vaccines are coming, youknow, from the moment this
started breaking out in theUnited States, he, he was trying
to close the door and say, wehave it under control and it's
(04:30):
going away.
Why?
Speaker 4 (04:32):
Right.
Well, it's the key thing for hisreelection.
He thought according to a lot ofstrategists is that the economy
must be booming.
As long as the economy isbooming, that was his path to
reelection.
And obviously the coronaviruspandemic has thrown a huge
monkey wrench that given all theeconomic damage that he has
done.
(04:53):
And, and he thought early onthat, the longer, he just tried
to downplay it, ignore it.
Just trying to tell people it'sa hoax that you would somehow
dampen people's anxiety.
And again, not cause people toget worried and therefore change
your behaviors and hurt theeconomy.
Can you tell him that he couldwin in that way for his
(05:17):
reelection, but the virus, thevirus is, will do its virus
thing.
It does not care about politicalbeliefs whatsoever.
It will transmit at every singleopportunity that you get it to
transmit, whether it's airborne,whether it's not wearing masks,
whether it's not this isn't seen, whether they're not taking any
public health precautions, nottesting conduct, Tracy, this is
(05:40):
why the virus really agnosticsthe politics and that kind of
dimension a trunk, just hismindset just could not deal with
this pandemic.
Speaker 2 (05:51):
All right.
It's important timeframe in howlong this virus is led to run
loose in some regard, is it not?
Because now that enters us intothis new conversation about a
new variant, which I want to askyou about, but the longer this
virus is around the, the moreit's going to change and adapt
(06:13):
and, and become vaccineresilient.
Is it not
Speaker 4 (06:18):
Well rag vaccine resiliency, vaccine escape is a
little bit more tricky.
Uh, we don't think that thiswill escape the vaccine, but you
are right that the longer thisvirus circulates in nature, that
he has a host or reservoir ofwhether it's humans or animals
(06:39):
to replicate pass on.
And in these hosts on mutate,the longer that keeps happening,
the more and more of thesemutations, these chanced unlucky
mutations that we will see.
And so this is why we have toreally eradicate zero COVID,
shouldn't be the goal becausewith zero COVID, we can
(07:01):
eradicate it for good and returnto complete normal.
But with this semi, you know, uh, lockdown semi, uh, keep the
embers, as long as it's almostgone, you know, that's half
Willy nilly approach or not endthis virus and will allow it to
become endemic for longterm andmutates more and more forms.
(07:24):
And we just cannot afford that
Speaker 2 (07:26):
Here in the United Kingdom, but also where you are
in the United States, that doesappear to be the pro the
approach though, as long as thehospitals can deal with the
inflow of patients, then youkind of release some of the
restrictions, let businessesopen again and movie theaters
and Cylons, and then the momentit looks like they're about to
(07:47):
be overwhelmed.
Again, they start locking downand that's what we're, we're
experiencing here in London, uh,because of this new development
with the virus, they are lockingdown and starting to get pretty
panicked, but they're nevergoing for what you talk about
this kind of zero approach tothe virus.
Speaker 4 (08:06):
Yeah.
My best analogy is, look, if youare owner with Jurassic park and
you know, you've almosteliminated all the velociraptors
, um, but welcome to the park.
Kids come to the park.
No one's gonna come to the parkand same with, if it was a zoo,
the full economic demand andmarginal propensity to consume,
(08:27):
and all of these things,economics, you will not return
until you have completelyeliminated that spiral.
This virus is just thatpernicious, uh, just that easy
way to, um, basically transmitthat it will really stall out
our economic development in somany different ways and hurt our
(08:49):
children in so many ways.
So a little bit of the vaccinestrategy, which I cannot, you
know, emphasize is so important,but isn't coming fast enough for
given the pace of inoculationszero COVID should be the goal
and really, truly stamp it out.
So that's never a menace to us.
Again, you really have to aimfor that.
(09:11):
And with the hospital criteria,it's so dumb.
Look, if that was the criteriafor everything, you know what?
You don't need to wear helmets,a hospital beds they're not
full, you don't need, uh, youknow, seatbelt laws or hospital
beds are not full.
That's not how public healthworks.
You reduce risk every single wayyou can.
(09:32):
And this is the friends of thesame reason.
Um, I think secondhand smoke isit is a good analogy.
Second hand smoke, extra hurtsand causes cancer and heart
disease and deaths and otherpeople, right?
That's why it's bandedrestaurants and bars and this,
and this hurting other people.
This, we have to take thisprevention model and the
community model truly we needto, in order to in guarantee
(09:56):
economic development, we need tostop this virus for good.
And we need to think of thecollective good and not just
think of, Oh, are the hospitalbeds full?
We're not really.
We really have to focus on zeroCOVID as the goal.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
How concerned are you about this new variant that
they've traced back to at leaststarting here in the United
Kingdom, especially in the SouthEast and around London, where I
am to September, they think, um,and it has quote unquote by the
government taken off.
How concerned are you?
Is this just another variant insome 4,000 variants?
(10:34):
Or would you say, no, this is alot more significant.
Speaker 4 (10:38):
Yeah, we've had a lot of variants, but this is
significant given that thenumber of mutations is
accumulated is huge.
It's like a huge jump step upfrom the average rate of
mutation.
And it's in the spike proteinand in the binding domains,
which means it can likely modifyhow this virus functions and
(11:01):
this increased transmissibilityanywhere between 50 and 70% is
worrisome.
That said it doesn't change howwe, our public guidelines are.
We know how to stop this virus.
It's basically wear masks, takedistance precautions, but that's
not enough to take airborneprecautions because this is the
(11:22):
airborne virus and henceventilate and do all these, uh,
contesting contracts racing.
All of these things don'tchange.
These strategies still work.
The problem is this virus justmove so much faster.
If these public healthcontainment measures are not in
place and no one wants to lockdown, I don't want to lock down.
(11:43):
No one wants to lock down.
That's a last resort, but unlesswe can do all these proper
public health things, lockdownis the only way to go.
And obviously that hurts all alot of people.
So it doesn't change in apercent, uh, what we should be
doing, that it just changes theurgency.
And I think the increased riskof transmission in children,
(12:05):
that speculation also increasesthe urgency that if we want our
kids to go back to school in thenear future, we really have to
get this under control.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
All right.
That's what I want to ask youabout, because up until now,
it's been gauged here in anotherparts of the United States that
it's more important to keepschools open than it is to keep
kids away from COVID becausethey don't generally get a lot
of big reactions to it or, orthey're they're asymptomatic.
(12:35):
Uh, but no doubt it is spreadingamongst kids.
And this new variant appears tobe based on initial reports.
And I understand studies arestill going on and you're
you're, you don't have firsthandstudies, uh, in front of you
right now, but what do youthink, how do you interpret that
data that you're starting to seeabout its ability to spread with
(12:55):
kids?
And what does that mean to, toschool openings, which are just
around the corner,
Speaker 4 (13:01):
Right?
And I think this is one of thefactors that really worries me
because this transmissibilitypeople have downplayed it in
children for the longest time.
Now, granted children don't dieat a high rate, but they do get
sick and do get hospitalized.
And some have, of course,unfortunately do die, but this
(13:21):
is only more important for ourkids, because if it is true, if
it is preliminary, data is truethat this elevates the
transmission risk among kids tothe level of Advil, which is
what they're speculating.
This means that children areefficient vectors as adults.
And that means schools willbecome much more dangerous of a
(13:44):
place.
Now, obviously of all the thingsto open, the last things to
close down should be schools.
And so I would rather close downbars and restaurants before it
closed schools, but this reallychanged the ball game around
schools.
And this emphasizes thatstopping the virus, ultimately
(14:05):
stopping the virus throughvaccinations or through these
other public health containermeasures, Texas tech testing
conduct, raising massventilation, airport
precautions.
It just takes on a level ofurgency.
I cannot emphasize enough andpeople are just also ignoring
(14:25):
the fact that it's airborne thiswash.
Your hands is important in theearly days, but I think wash
your hands.
It's still important, but notnearly as important as ventilate
and not nearly as important asyou know, um, using, um,
advanced Merv 13 filtersgermicidal UV for, for, for
(14:47):
office buildings and, um, newerschools, all these things take
on a new level of urgency,unfortunately.
And if so, if this variant holdsout true, which is now detected
in like dozens of countriesworldwide, it is very worrisome
for our kids going back toschool
Speaker 2 (15:05):
More widespread than we realize because, Oh, Kay's
very, very good at analyzinglike a hundred times better at,
at doing genome sequencing and,and studying the development of
the, of the virus.
Do you think that there's just alot of other countries that just
haven't recognized howwidespread this is already in
their populations?
Speaker 4 (15:27):
Yeah, absolutely.
And remember the old adage, notesting, no cases, no pandemic.
Well in this, uh, situation,it's no genomic sequencing new,
no mutations, no new variants.
It's, it's this.
And it's a very backwards, youknow, see, you know, you will
hear no evil, but is there atruly evil, um, we don't know.
(15:49):
And the us is ranked number 43in the world in terms of
percentage of total casessequenced the virus.
Okay.
The sequence.
So we're really behind the ballgame here and we think it could
already be behind.
Remember in the spring, we haddiscovered that we were two
months behind identification ofthe early Washington state cases
(16:13):
because we didn't, we lackinglacking testing and you know,
January, February.
So this is the worry that it'salready here.
It's already circulating.
Now it's not more deadly or, um,you know, virulent than the
previous drains.
But again, what's what makesthis fire so unique is that it
(16:36):
doesn't kill everyone reallyquickly.
Because if you do like a Bolawith 50% mortality, this fires
wouldn't take over the world.
It spreads pernicious Lilly,heart kills a lot of people, but
also harmlessly passes throughmany.
And this bad things are manybecause of is contagious.
This is what gives it thepernicious property to take on
(16:59):
the world as a pandemic.
So we have to stop it and wehave to take a whole, no
prisoner, zero a zero COVIDbecause those countries that
have New Zealand, Taiwan,Australia, China, and Vietnam,
they've enjoyed hundreds of daysof no community transmissions or
(17:19):
for the most part and all and nodeaths.
And they're having concertssports games do it.
Life is basically returned tonormal and they have not paid
any further price beyond theinitial lockdown period, but we
are constantly paying it againand again, with multi-trillion
dollar relief bills that wecan't afford on the longterm, we
(17:43):
have to do it and we have tostop it.
Now,
Speaker 2 (17:46):
Editorial in the garden by an Anthony.
Who's a professor of globalhealth and sustainable
development at universitycollege here in London, um, says
don't blame the new developmentwith the virus for where we are.
He says the prime minister'srepeated dithering delays and
seeming inability to makeunpopular decisions have led
(18:08):
Britain to one of the worstdeath rates in the world.
We can only hope that we're notin that position by Easter.
He says, there's a lot ofparallels between what's
happened in Britain and what hashappened under president Trump.
Speaker 4 (18:20):
Yeah, absolutely.
And I agree the most of theglobal cases, hospitalizations
and deaths are not due to thenew, very new, very is still a
small minority of the totalviruses that circulating.
And you know, it really is ashow of how big the difference
(18:41):
good leadership makes.
Um, in New Zealand, just Cindaart and Shirley leadership
allowed to huge move fast andtake the precautionary
principle.
Taiwan did the same thing aswell.
Um, Taiwan's vice-president isactually a Johns Hopkins trained
epidemiologist.
(19:01):
They move fast.
They, you know, they do blinkwhen it came to, uh, how bad
this could be.
They knew that they had to getunder control and that takes
leadership decisiveness.
If you want to be sure, 100%sure before you act, you will be
too late as a who immersionsdirector.
(19:23):
Mike Ryan said, this is why goodleadership in these times of
crisis makes all the difference.
This is not like a hurricanethat's already blown through.
This is an active storm.
That's still raging and thefaster you can stop it, the
faster you can enjoy life again.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
Last question to you, what is the risk?
And I don't want to overdramatize it, but it seems to me
in everything that I've read,that you've already talked
about, the new variant changing,somewhat the development of the
spike protein, which is what thevaccines are designed to cling
(20:02):
on to an attack.
If we did there to use somebodyelse's words again, if this goes
on with us, just kind of lettingthe steam out of the lockdowns
and then locking down a bit moreand then letting it run again,
run hot.
Isn't there a danger that thesevaccines that we need so badly
(20:23):
at a certain point will getoutpaced by COVID-19, which is
constantly adapting to itsenvironment.
Speaker 4 (20:33):
Yeah, it's this, this coronavirus, it's not as fast
mutating as say the flu, but itdoes mutate over time.
And the longer we let it linger,especially for many, many years
there be vaccine escape.
To some degree, it won't be, youknow, right now say maternal
adviser, a 95% efficacy.
(20:54):
It won't be that it drops tozero, but it could drop a
significant percentages.
The more mutations it has now,we're doing lab studies right
now to show how much, um, the,our antibodies, the resistance
that we develop from thisvaccine will, uh, attack this
new variant.
(21:15):
And some people say probablywon't affect much at most, a few
percentage points dropped, butthe longer we let it roam free,
the more it will pick up theseresistance.
And I use the word resistancebecause it's slightly not
exactly the slightly akin toantibiotic resistance, right?
The, you use more ways to attackit.
(21:38):
Especially certain drugs likemonoclonal antibodies, which
people speculate it could be useof the monoclonal antibodies in
the immunocompromised person,but the more you attack the
virus, the more it will try andways to beach and the more time
and more bodies in which you canlive for a while to mutate the
(21:58):
more, the greater, the risk thatthis could happen.
And that is what we ultimatelydon't want.
Now, granted, we can modify theMRD vaccines pretty quickly.
We had this vaccine, we areadministering now back in
February, we can synthesizepretty fast, but the trials
would take so long and take somuch effort and time, and we
(22:20):
will lose a lot of cases.
And we'll go through more ofthese openings.
Lockdowns at the pandemic is notcontrol.
We have to stop it now.
And the fact scene thing, youknow, it's a more of a
multi-year thing.
If it becomes a significantvaccine escape, but that should
not be a consideration right nowconsideration right now is we
(22:41):
have to stop it for a wholecollective of public health,
children's educational andeconomic reasons.
And long-term, if we do not stopit in 2021, 2022, we let it keep
roaming.
Then the vaccine escape willreally catch up with us in a few
years.
And that's what we ultimatelydefinitely want to avoid as
(23:01):
well.
Speaker 2 (23:02):
All right, Dr.
Eric, figgle ding.
Very good to talk to you and, uh, an epidemiologist and health
economist, and I will confess,I've been trying to get him for
more than a week.
He's he's a busy guy and in highdemand.
So we really appreciate yourtime.
Speaker 4 (23:17):
Thank you.
Best wishes.
Thank you, sir.
Speaker 2 (23:27):
All right, let's go to Norritch.
Um, England in East Anglia, theNorth school of medicine, uh, is
at the university of East Angliaand Dr.
Paul Hunter, uh, is a professorin medicine.
Hi, Paul.
Hello.
Good afternoon.
You are a virologist.
Yeah, my medical specialty.
Speaker 1 (23:46):
I graduated in medicine, then I specialized in
medical, microbiology andvirology, but a lot of my, uh,
career has been, um, are alsoinvolved in, uh, public health
aspects of infectious disease.
Speaker 2 (23:59):
You probably never thought we would be in this
situation.
Speaker 1 (24:04):
Um, well actually one of our medical students, Amanda,
my old medical students, uh,sent me an email a couple of
months back saying he canremember a lecture that I gave
about 10, 15 years ago now whereI was predicting pretty much
that we would have somethinglike this at some time in there
in, uh, um, uh, uh, workingcareer.
(24:26):
So, uh, it's one thing topredict the one was expecting.
Speaker 2 (24:30):
I think that predicted it's quite another one
to face it.
And I mean, actually, did youreally believe that when you
kind of looked statistically andsaid, yeah, well, I mean, we're
probably do every century orsomething.
Yeah,
Speaker 1 (24:40):
No, absolutely.
Because, um, you know, we, formost of my professional career,
we've been experiencing one ortwo what's called emerging
infectious disease threats ayear.
And it was only really a matterof time before we had a big one
like this.
I mean, we've had in the lastfew years, we've had, um, Ebola
(25:04):
in West Africa, Zika virus inSouth America, uh, avian,
influenza, swine flu, all sortsof other threats, SARS and MERS.
And so they, they come aboutonce one or two a year on
average.
And it was only a matter of timebefore we had one as big as
this.
And as the world healthorganization, um, said a couple
(25:28):
of days ago, you know, thismight not actually be the big
one where they're full of goodnews.
Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (25:37):
So it may not actually be the big one because
they're expecting somethingthat's much stronger than this
virus.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
Well, be the case.
I mean, we're heading for about2 million deaths totally so far.
Um, with this pandemic and, um,Spanish flu, there was, I think
I'm writing saying there wassomething like 50 million deaths
worldwide and, um, it it's, uh,possibly only a matter of time
(26:03):
before we gain, we havesomething that can do offs this,
but hopefully
Speaker 2 (26:09):
Like we, we seem so utterly ill prepared for all of
it.
Look, as we speak, let's startoff on a positive app.
Oxford AstraZeneca has announcednow that their vaccine has been
approved.
So we have yet another bigvaccine out of the, I guess, out
of three big ones now, um, wouldyou take it, do you think this
(26:29):
is great news or
Speaker 1 (26:33):
I think it is, I think the, um, they're the three
main vaccines at the moment and,uh, for the West at least, but
there are others, there's theRussian Sputnik vaccine and
China's got it.
Seven vaccine, um, which is, um,again is slightly different to,
uh, the, so the, uh, Emma RNAvaccines for Pfizer Medina and
(26:54):
the add no virus vector vaccine,
Speaker 2 (26:58):
This one different than the Pfizer and the Madonna
Speaker 1 (27:01):
It's it's, it's delivered within a preexisting
virus, which is for the Oxfordone, it's a chimpanzee virus and
that gets into the cells andthen the DNA is released.
And then the, um, uh, then thatcell manufacturers that spike
protein, which is what you'retrying to gender the, um,
(27:23):
immunity to, um, the Pfizer andMedina vaccine.
So it's called MRN a vaccine.
So essentially what you're doingis injecting messenger RNA into,
um, uh, uh, little packages thatthen get taken up and then get
replicated into, into theprotein.
(27:44):
And so ultimately the end, theend result is, is, is the same,
but they, uh, they, there aremany different, um, issues in
how you handle these differentvaccines.
Certainly.
Speaker 2 (27:57):
I don't know many mainstream people that don't
have concerns about the safetyof the vaccines, even
traditional people thatgenerally say, yeah, you know,
vaccines are fine.
They give them to their kids.
These have been rolled out soquickly in such a compressed
period of time.
I mean, there, there are still alot of concerns with some pretty
sober people.
I mean, these are notanti-vaxxers, but just generally
(28:18):
people who are worried about,you know, do you take it or do
you wait awhile?
Speaker 1 (28:22):
Yeah.
I mean, I, I, I've got nohesitation, you know, I'm just
desperately looking to theopportunity to have my shots,
which the last time I lookedmight not be till April may.
Um, although with the Oxfordvaccine coming out, I think
that, I mean, this issue aboutthe speed is, is that these have
(28:42):
got to effectively got tomarket.
Um, when you realize what thereasons for the delays are
normally, then it becomes, um,less frightening.
The, the issue with mostvaccines is that when you're
developing a new vaccine, so anydisease, the first thing is you
(29:03):
never sure it's going to work.
So what happens is that youpersuade somebody to fund your
initial research, to show thatyou can develop a vaccine and
that may be, and then go on toshow that it works possibly an
animal experiments.
And, um, and then once you'vegot those, you write those up
(29:25):
and you then go through anotherround of persuading, somebody to
fund the phase one studies, uh,which if they're successful, you
fund the second phase twostudies.
And, and the other thing is thatfor most, uh, infectious
diseases that you're trying todevelop, uh, vaccines to you
don't have actually that muchdisease around.
(29:46):
So the, even when you do get tophase three trials, it takes a
long time to accumulate enoughcases in your study for you to
be able to judge the efficacy ofthe vaccine what's happened here
is that effectively all thesemanufacturers, all these vaccine
(30:06):
producers were funded up frontfor the whole thing.
They, um, so they didn't, oncethey'd completed the phase one
studies, they could, they didn'tthen have to go begging for
money to do the next bit.
And also because of, uh, thatthey were able to, um, overlap
(30:30):
the different studies.
So that as soon as you've gotpreliminary data, showing that
phase, once it's safe, you canthen, uh, pretty much quickly go
onto the phase two studies andso on.
So, so all the steps have beengone through,
Speaker 2 (30:45):
Right, in saying that with the Oxford AstraZeneca and
maybe with the others too, thatbecause we're in the middle of a
pandemic and especially in theUnited Kingdom where you have a
national healthcare system.
Yes, they were, they were veryquick in getting it out to
people, having the right people,take it for their studies and
being able to get those resultsback.
Speaker 1 (31:06):
Yeah.
And, and importantly, havingthose right people actually get
sick.
Um, and you, because, you know,you only know that the vaccine
has worked once people startgetting sick in your study.
And then what happens is theonce you've got enough people
who have actually developed thedisease, you break the code and
(31:27):
see whether or not the peoplewho've developed the disease
have been in, have had thevaccine or a placebo.
And, um, and that's why thatphase three studies, which
typically can take several yearsto complete, have been, um, able
to got big gut through quitequickly,
Speaker 2 (31:49):
As we speak, there are a lot of people sick and
there are numbers of people sickin America, sick in Europe,
United Kingdom, um, very closeto leading the death toll in
Europe, again, um, this newvariant and pull it's really
what I wanted to talk to youabout.
Are you alarmed by the newvariant?
Speaker 1 (32:10):
Oh, desperately.
So, um, I can remember one of,one of the days that I will
remember most about the epidemicwas, uh, in part because it
shocked me and I wasn'texpecting it was when the prime
minister gave his, uh, his, um,presentation about a week a
(32:39):
Saturday.
What was, it was about a weekbefore Christmas about this,
Speaker 2 (32:43):
You know, it's not very long ago.
It seems in this news cycle, itseems like it was a long time
ago.
It was just a week beforeChristmas.
And that was 72 hours after hehad come out and said it would
be inhuman, just create alockdown through Christmas.
Speaker 1 (32:58):
Absolutely.
And, um, and th what he said wasthat the second sentence was
effectively that as far as theycan tell, the new variant has an
R value of more than 0.4 overthe pre-existing variants.
(33:21):
Now we've, um, we we're hopingto publish this soon, but we've,
we've been looking at howeffective the Nash, the November
lockdown was.
And generally it was prettyeffective.
It must be said, you know, interms of suppressing the virus,
um, and most regions were ableto get down on average to about
(33:43):
an R value of 0.7, um, in forthat, for their epidemics.
Speaker 2 (33:50):
You know, Paul, there's a lot of people that
don't understand the R value,especially in America, because
it's talked about in newsconferences here all the time,
but the R value essentially asif it's an R value of one, that
means you infect one otherperson.
If it's one and a half, you'reinspecting, you're bending
silent half, you're passing iton.
So it's gotta be below one.
Speaker 1 (34:08):
It's got to be below one now.
So the simple maths was, if ourNovember lockdown was able to
get the existing variants downto an R value of 0.7, and this
new variant was 0.4, that takesabove one.
And so what, what essentiallythat said was that the, that the
(34:32):
November lockdown was notsufficient to reverse the
increase in this new variant,which is very scary.
And that means that, you know,we, um, and as soon as he said
that, you know, I felt, actuallyfelt physically sick because
that meant that this, you know,even with it, uh, locked down,
(34:56):
like if we'd continued theNovember lockdown, we would
almost certainly have continuedto have, uh, increasing numbers
of cases, increasing number ofhospitalizations and increasing
numbers of deaths.
Speaker 2 (35:08):
And by the way, we are seeing those now.
Speaker 1 (35:10):
Yeah, absolutely.
Yes, yes.
Yeah.
And so it was extraordinarilyworrying.
It means cause we tend to usethe term non-pharmaceutical
interventions and although for,for these, and they'll they lock
downs is, um, it's a sort of acatch-all phrase.
The reality is that lockdown isa very, you know, means very
(35:33):
different things.
You know, it can be just aPope's restaurants are closed,
shops are closed or it could be,everybody has to stay at home.
It could mean, you know, andthere's a difference between
lockdowns with schools open anddown,
Speaker 2 (35:48):
We're in London and we're in a, we're in a tier four
lockdown, which means beautysalons, gyms, all of the main
shopping centers, which wereopen just before Christmas had
to be closed, but you can stillgo to work.
You can still, uh, travel onpublic transit.
They say, if you need to, butmost people who want money will
(36:10):
say that they need to indeed.
Um, so it's it's, and you're notallowed to socialize with other
households that shut all of thatChristmas three household mixing
idea that just shut it all down.
Do you think that is workingnow?
Speaker 1 (36:27):
Yeah.
And that, that was depressingbecause actually, although a lot
of my colleagues were arguingagainst having celebrations over
Christmas.
I was not one of them because Ifelt that we could, I felt the
three, uh, family Christmas, uh,rule could have allowed us to
(36:48):
manage Christmas safely, uh, andless of a risk than actually
going about our normal dailylife, uh, early on in the month.
But this new variant of course,just, yeah, I mean, it just, uh,
throw out,
Speaker 2 (37:05):
Do you alarm that beyond the R the replication
number?
Speaker 1 (37:10):
If we can't stop this disease, if whatever we do
shorter vaccination increased.
Well, there's a number ofthings.
The first is that forgettingabout vaccination at the moment,
what this means is that casenumbers will increase, um,
rapidly, no matter, uh, possiblyno matter how strict our
(37:33):
lockdowns are.
And of course you can't lockdowns, can't be ever totally
strict.
I mean, if we were able toenforce a rule that said, okay,
for the next month, nobody atall is allowed to leave their
house.
Then, uh, the virus would prettymuch have disappeared and may
(37:55):
well have actually totallydisappeared.
The problem is that there'd be alot of people dead from
starvation and the watersupplies would have stopped
working and, and our electricitywouldn't be on and all these
other things, which we need tokeep us alive.
So it's, it's always has to be abalance between how restrictive
(38:16):
you, you want to be.
And actually, how do you keeppeople, keep society going, um,
at the lockdown and seems to me
Speaker 2 (38:26):
What balance it seems to me watching this government
in Britain, and then alsowatching the, the Trump.
I don't even want tocharacterize it, but I mean, the
Trump tragic tragic comedy, um,that there's, there was this
idea of herd immunity in thebeginning.
And then they started to kind ofget into this other system
(38:47):
where, you know, they would,they would lift the lid, um,
just until hospitals started tosee those increase numbers.
And they were worried about thehospitals getting overwhelmed,
and then they would put it down.
Whereas in Asia, the philosophywas very much shut it down,
eliminate it, and then reopened.
And, and in Western Europe andin America, um, Canada was a bit
(39:12):
better where I'm from generallythough it was, you know, let it,
let it simmer.
Speaker 1 (39:18):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And I think that was a mistake.
And I think, I think the, um, wecertainly didn't in this country
do well enough to control thisepidemic.
And I think the, the fact thatwe, that the new variant arose
in the UK, there is nothingspecial about where new variants
(39:40):
can arise.
But the only thing that driveswhether or not you're going to
get a new variant in one placeor another is how much more
disease you've got in one placeor another, you know, the
likelihood of getting a newvariant appearing in a place is
solely related to the number ofinfections.
(40:01):
So if we'd managed to bring ourinfections lower during the
summer and September, if we'dgot an effective test track and
trace that actually workedproperly, if we, um, uh, being a
little bit more cautious aboutopening up some of the
hospitality venues andencouraging people to go on, um,
(40:24):
uh, to go to restaurants duringAugust on particular days,
because that's when you've gotthe half price meal.
And that's when it was reallybusy, um, that, um, you know, we
might not have actually hadenough cases around to have
actually kick-started theEnglish barrier, but then of
course the, you know, there'sthe South African variants.
(40:47):
So, you know, it wouldn'tnecessarily
Speaker 2 (40:49):
Very, very quickly.
Just two more questions.
One is, you said the Englishvariant look, I was looking at
the center for strategic risksin America.
Um, and there, there are a lotof former defense officials and
people who have died who havedealt with the risk of
biological warfare.
And I have a lot of respect forthem, but they talked about the
(41:13):
genome sequencing sequencingthat takes place in the United
Kingdom.
Um, and that there really isn'tanything comparable to in other
places and that the us shouldhave it, but that the number
that they use in the UnitedStates 0.3% of cases have been
sequenced in the United Kingdom.
It's about five, 10% roughly,right?
(41:35):
Yes.
The us is ranked 43 in theworld, by the way, which I think
is shocking.
So look that may tell us, yeah,the UK is better at sequencing.
Doesn't it also tell us thatthis variant, while it's really
been identified in the UnitedKingdom and people are sealing
their borders to the UK, it isprobably much more widespread
than we realize.
Speaker 1 (41:55):
Yeah, it is now.
But I think, I think the balanceof evidence is it probably
started initially in theSoutheast of England, maybe
Kent, but, you know, we can'tsay that for certain, you know,
one of the things, as I'm sureyou know about Kent is that it's
sort of quite close to thechannel tunnel.
(42:16):
And so, you know, a lot of them,
Speaker 2 (42:18):
All the truck drivers passing through and stuff,
Speaker 1 (42:22):
Well, you can't exclude that, but it did, you
know, um, but, uh, it, itcertainly is spreading more
widely.
Um, it, it's now in the States,it's now in Canada, it's in
Australia and it's, uh, itpretty in print, I think most
European countries where they'veactually looked for it.
Speaker 2 (42:44):
Do you, in your initial reaction, which you
described as feeling physicallyill when you saw the increasing
our rates, um, and realize thisnew VR variant, uh, had taken
off, do you believe that, um, weare battling the clock in that
(43:06):
this variant, it is just amatter of time because we're
seeing mutations in the spikeprotein, which it attaches the
vaccines attach onto.
If we don't roll out vaccineseffectively, if this is not
handled quickly and the lid putback on all of this, that the
virus is simply going to outpaceand I'm smart than you vaccines,
Speaker 1 (43:30):
You're quite right.
I mean, at the moment, there isno evidence that it's made a big
change to the ability of thevaccine to protect against that
strain.
The big problem though, is thatwe do, we S um, uh, I I've been
saying this for some time andprobably one of the few people
(43:52):
in the UK that is actually, uh,quoted as saying this for some
time.
But, um, I was gratified to knowthat the chief scientist of the
world health organization twodays ago said exactly the same
thing.
We do not know whether any ofthe current vaccines actually
stop infection.
(44:12):
So, um, it is certainlyplausible that the vaccines and
I think the, um, there is, uh, Ithink the Oxford AstraZeneca
vaccine have actually looked atthis and the thought does it
didn't actually make that muchdifference to whether somebody
an infection or not.
(44:34):
But what it does is stop peopleor reduce the chances of people
developing things symptomatic
Speaker 2 (44:40):
Right now.
No, I'm alarmed now I'm alone,because what you're telling me
is if it doesn't stop infectionyeah, lets you continue on.
But that means all of the socialdistancing, all of the mask
wearing all of that is going tohave to continue because this
vaccine will continue tocirculate and continue to mutate
and develop.
And eventually
Speaker 1 (45:00):
It's quite plausible.
Yeah.
And it may well be the case thatalthough at the moment that the
spike proteins is still, uh, uh,uh, close enough for the vaccine
to work, um, at some point,presumably it's quite possible
that we will get some nutationthat is, uh, that's the called
(45:20):
escape mutants that, that nolonger is controlled by the
vaccine, but it shouldn't bethat we weren't have to go
through the huge process thatwe've had to this year to, to
modify the vaccines for any newmutation.
But the issue is in people whodon't have vaccine, if it does,
(45:40):
if these vaccines don't stoptransmission, although they'll
almost certainly reduce theprobability of transmission,
even if they don't stop, stopit, but if they don't stop it,
then any concept of herdimmunity from vaccination, just
evaporates, you know, and, um,so that people who elect not to
(46:03):
be vaccinated for whateverreason or can't because of
preexisting disease or whatever,um, they're still very much at
risk of getting the infection ofgetting severe disease and, and,
and dying depending on otherrisk factors and their age and
so on.
So yeah, it is.
(46:24):
And, and I think with this, um,more infectious, um, variant
that becomes even more difficultfor people who don't have the
vaccine, they're even more atrisk of continuing to be getting
the infection.
So I think to be honest, Ican't, you know, I, well, I've
(46:48):
been saying for months that, youknow, I can see my
grandchildren's grandchildren,well, I won't be around then,
but you know, I, I stronglysuspect that my grandchildren's
grandchildren will still begetting infections with
COVID-19, but they almostcertainly will not be dying by
then.
And almost certainly the diseasethat we S that they would
(47:10):
experience, won't be that muchdifferent from the common cold.
And that is, and I'm saying thatbecause we know that's happened
at least twice in the past,where a very similar to virus
virus to COVID-19 has got intohuman society probably was
responsible for large of deathsfor the few years.
(47:31):
And then after that, it justsort of, we came to a, um, um,
uh, a, a situation where it wasjust the common cold bond,
Speaker 2 (47:41):
But you're saying there's still some very
difficult years potentiallyahead of us, even though the UK
health minister was ontelevision this morning, saying
this is all going to be over inthe spring.
I mean, he is that's, I thinkthat is in the extreme.
Speaker 1 (47:56):
I think that is overly optimistic personally.
I, it, I think the things willbe a lot better by the spring.
Don't get me wrong, you know, bythe time we're into the spring
and people who, um, are wantingare accepting of the vaccine of
the vaccine that is going tomake a huge difference.
(48:17):
And I can't see next summerbeing anywhere near as difficult
as this last year.
And I, you know, um, uh, the,um, I quite personally, I
totally expecting to be able totravel and go to meetings, um,
come next summer and Septemberagain.
Speaker 2 (48:38):
You're right.
I hope you're right.
And I, uh, I'm watchingpresident elect Biden criticize
the Trump rollout of the vaccinebecause this is a race against
time saying the way it's going.
It will take years not months.
The UK government seems poisedand they have promised a speedy,
efficient rollout, but they havebungled everything, uh, up until
(49:00):
now.
So
Speaker 1 (49:01):
White
Speaker 2 (49:04):
Dr.
Paul Hunter, a professor ofmedicine at the Norwich school
of medicine, university of EastAnglia.
Great to talk to you, Paul.
Thank you so much.
Bye pleasure.
Speaker 3 (49:13):
That's our backstory, the last edition of 2020.
We wish you, well, pleasesubscribe to backstory.
I've now launched a newnewsletter to help you digest
and navigate the daily news,because I think a lot of people
and people tell me they don'tknow how to read daily news and
watch television and figure outwhat's true.
(49:33):
And what's disinformation.
Check it out.
Dana Lewis's backstorynewsletter on sub stock.
I'll try to explain news andgive you an idea how I source
it.
And I'll even put the linksthere in 2021.
I'll continue to bring youweekly podcasts focusing on
international news.
Here's what the astrologers sayabout 2020.
(49:57):
It was a cataclysmic aligning ofplanets that ends in the new
year.
Thank goodness.
And 2021 ushers in the age ofAquarius, what changes are
astrologists predicting in 2021?
If this year saw our regularways of life up ended, then next
year is tipped to offertechnological advancements and
the mending of communities theysay on December the 21st, 20, 20
(50:21):
Jupiter and Saturn met inAquarius.
And they'll remain in this signfor the majority of year.
Aquarius is a sign associatedwith abrupt change, forming
communities fighting for causesthat you care about and making
technological advances.
Anyway, that's what a strolleryou're saying.
And I think I'll take any goodnews at this point.
(50:43):
Thanks for listening tobackstory on Dana Lewis and
London.
And I'll talk to you again soon.
On the other side in 2021,
Speaker 5 (51:56):
[inaudible].
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