Coronavirus (COVID-19) Discussion Thread

[haxxiy]

curl-6 said:

haxxiy said:

Well, pandemic viruses do tend to become milder over time and eventually become an endemic illness; the viral subtypes responsible for all three flu pandemics of the 20th century, Spanish Flu, (H1N1) Hong Kong Flu, (H3N2) and Asian Flu (H2N2) all still circulate today.

On the other hand, hopefully COVID-19 will be more like smallpox or polio where vaccination can eliminate it.

To completely eliminate it would be ideal, since even now betacoronaviruses do cause ARS in some people and are suspected as a factor in certain nervous and conjunctive tissue diseases. But we've succeeded to do so only once in history, with a far worse and more visible disease. And before the anti-vaxxers too...

If immunity from a vaccine or the disease itself isn't permanent but allows a milder but still contagious reinfection one or two years down the road (as it goes for the other coronaviruses), that's another path to making it endemic too, even if all current outbreaks are suppressed.