This has more mutations than any other variant that's been seen and
a number of the mutations are on the spike protein, so that's what really
is raising people's anxiety level. Whether it's the mRNA vaccines or the J&J vaccine or
some of the protein vaccines that may come down later, they're all focused on targeting
and developing an immune response to the spike protein, and spike is what attaches to the cells
too, so that probably, well definitely, relates to transmissibility, so mutations in the spike
can increase transmissibility and also potentially increase
the ability for the virus to avoid antibodies made by the vaccine. We have no clear idea whether
the vaccines will be equally effective or not, but I think the argument would be that we know that
there's a potential that it might not be and that the higher your antibody concentrations are, the
more likely it is to be able to work and so if you haven't gotten a booster, you need to get boosted.
So the clinical presentation is going to be the same, right? COVID-19 is COVID-19, and so
it's going to present identically,
I think we just all are trying to make our way through the days, I mean this is now
going almost on two years of COVID and so I don't think you're going to feel much different.
We still have a significant amount of transmission that's occurring in Sacramento
due to the Delta variance so I'm not necessarily expecting anything to change significantly.
We'll just have to see. I think people should be
thoughtful but not necessarily concerned, right? I think that people should be watchful about what's
happening. I think you're still looking at making sure that you've got a booster dose of vaccine
or if you haven't been vaccinated, get vaccinated, and then consider
minimizing exposures to big large groups unless it's outdoors.
So the most important thing about Omicron is that it continues to be
the evolution of COVID-19. The more people that get infected, the more likely we are to see more
variants come back behind it and so again this is a message to get people vaccinated, right?
Right now, the unvaccinated population is really keeping the whole pandemic moving along.
You're not going to see the number of breakthrough cases
if people are all vaccinated, right? Because that's the way you finally crush this and we're just not
really at a level within our population. We're pretty darn good here at UC Davis,
but within the population at large, we're not at a level where we can really stop spread and
every time the virus infects somebody else, there's a chance for more mutations and if
those mutations are beneficial to the virus, they're going to keep taking off and so
the more people infected, the more likely there are going to be... we're going to have to learn the
whole darn Greek alphabet. The public should know that staying vigilant is a good thing
and getting vaccinated if you're not is a good thing. That's ultimately the way out of this thing.