Minusfourty
Traveler
- Joined
- Nov 17, 2021
- Messages
- 26
- Reaction score
- 44
- Awards
- 10
Someone posted this article the other day into the thread The Implications of Omicron, and the numbers just seemed off. 46 Mutations for a variant didn't sound right. So I looked into it, and it is most certainly not right.
With the initial wuhan variant of the coronavirus, the mutation rate was calculated to be 1x10^-6, or around a 3rd of the flu's at 3x10^-5 (1). For reference, this translates to aroud 40-50 mutations per year (2).Apparently the flu's rate is already a bit high, which is why it has stuck around for so long, so 1/3 seems reasonable. But the virus is far from reasonable. Around August 2020, the alpha variant was discovered, with 13 new mutations(3). This would line up with the previous estimates, around 1/3rd of the flu's yearly rate. But wait, there's more. Also in august 2020, the beta variant was discovered. This one had another 10 mutations, bringing the total up to 23.
I don't know what's going on here, but in the words of PeanutButterGamer:
In early 2021, the gamma variant was discovered. Relatively consistent with the first 2, it had 10 mutations, three of which were nearly identical to the beta variant. This brings the total up to 30. Delta was discovered around late 2020, but was named around early 2021. It has around 13-17 mutations, depending on the source used, That brings to total to around 45 in the course of a year. And then there was omicron. It was discovered in late November 2021, with a whopping 50 new mutations, making it 70 times as transmissible. In scientific terms, that is very big. Delta was around 40% more transmissible, and that was already surprising. This would also bring the mutation total up to around 95 in about 14 months, around 200% the rate of the flu, which would be a rate of around 81 per year or nearly 600% the initial mutation rate. But just a few days ago, france found a variant with another 46 new mutations. That would bring the total up to 140 within 16 months, leading to a rate of 107 per year, or 269% of the flu's yearly rate. This puts it at EIGHT HUNDRED PERCENT the mutation rate of the wuhan strain."Uh, it's probably not a problem, probably, but I'm showing a small discrepancy in... well, no, it's well within acceptable bounds again. Sustaining sequence."
I don't know what's going on here, but in the words of PeanutButterGamer:
This is not a normal!