By Dona Suri
The first two weeks of December saw the average daily covid hospitalizations in the USA rise by 15.8 percent. It’s no surprise: for the past three years, covid infections have peaked every winter. The weather is to blame only in so far as it pushes people indoors in close proximity … and this is also the holiday season. Lots of family gatherings and parties, lots of travelling. All of which means that an extrovert virus gets a chance to mingle and socialize.
Looking at the statistics, one sees a surge in August-September, then numbers slacked off in October but started rising again in late November. The way it works is that more contagious virus strains overtake and push out less contagious strains.
Here’s what the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) think happened. At the end of September this year, EG.5 was responsible for 29.4 percent of cases, which was more than any other single SARS-CoV-2 strain circulating in the US. Then two new and highly contagious strains came along. HV.1 and JN.1 are mutations of the omicron variety of the virus. JN.1 mutated from BA.2.86, alias pirola.
HV.1 was identified in July 2023 in the US, and JN.1 was spotted only in August this year in Luxembourg. Omicron itself emerged not so long ago, in November, 2021. HV.1 is presently dominant, but JN.1 is moving up fast and now is responsible for 21 percent of cases.
Since the entire omicron family is highly contagious, the new covid strains are likely to power a major surge in covid cases in 2024. If they do, people themselves will be at least partly to blame because they have “forgotten” all about the corona years and no longer take covid seriously. Effective vaccines are available but obviously a vaccine can do you no good if it’s just sitting on the shelf. Few people have come forward to take the shot.
Is popular indifference justified? Do the new variants have different symptoms? Are HV.1 and JN.1 just pussycats compared to the original killer Wuhan-Hu.1?
Neither HV.1 nor JN.1 produce symptoms that are more severe than previous strains, but it is inevitable that, if a large number of people come down with covid, then, proportionately, more people are going to wind up in the hospital and some of them are not going to pull through.
Here’s what we know about HV.1:
The SARS-CoV-2 family tree is huge and complex. One branch of it is the omicron clan. In the 25 months of omicron’s existence, it has spun off hundreds of mutations, all designated by alphabets: BA-this, BA-that, EGs and XBBs. HV.1 mutated from XBB.1.9.2, itself a mutation of EG.5 alias Eris, which in turns goes back to BA.2.86.
Before it was overtaken by HV.1, the dominant variety was XBB.1.5. About a third of all people presently suffering from covid have the HV.1 variety. .
This variety took off really fast from the day it was discovered back in July, 2023. It went from 0.5 percent of cases in July to 12.5 percent in September and by November, it was accounting for about 30 percent of all cases. When it comes to transmissibility, HV.1 is presently the GOAT.
The spread of HV.1 is helped by fading immunity. During past outbreaks, people got sick and recovered, or they got vaccinated. Their immunity was strong … for a while. Now, people who have not kept up with thevaccine boosters are back to square one.
Thankfully, HV.1 doesn’t make its victims sicker than previous covid strains but it looks like HV.1 is good at getting around the body’s defences. Still, doctors aren’t sure. How do you accurately track a new variant if hardly anybody is getting tested?
Here’s what we know about JN.1:
The other worrisome new covid mutation is JN.1. Back in August, virologists noted a huge mutation in the omicron strain of the virus. The mutant was named BA.2.86, and nicknamed pirola. It had multiple genetic differences from previous versions of SARS-CoV-2, particularly in the spike protein. This spike protein is what enables the virus to enter human cells and cause infection. Would a “new and improved” spike protein mean higher transmissibility and increased ability to evade immune responses?
The CDC and the World Health Organization warned that, because of the speed at which it was mutating, pirola needed to be watched minute-to-minute.
Scientists were still taking stock of pirola when this variant spun off another mutation … a fast-growing strain that got the name, JN.1. Within weeks, JN.1 became more common than pirola. Researchers concluded that JN.1 is more infectious and it has the ability to evade vaccine immunity.
JN.1 was first spotted in Luxembourg on August 25, 2023, followed by England, Iceland, France, and the United States – all reporting cases in September. As of this writing, it has spread to more than 40 countries. On December 8, it turned up in the Indian state of Kerala.
In the US, it has grown to represent an estimated 15 to 30 percent of new infections, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control. The CDC expects that JN.1’s prevalence in the U.S. will continue to increase.
In India, the nationwide active case count stood at 938 in the first week of December, with Kerala recording the highest number of patients, a total of 768. Cases are rising and Indian health authorities are justifiably nervous. Part of the nervousness stems from the fact that the covid plague of 2020-21 has simply vanished from popular memory, as though it never happened.
The good news is that COVID-19 tests and treatments are expected to work on JN.1 and the updated covid shot will protect against it.
Data on the number of people coming forward to get updated vaccinations shows that Americans and Indians are very much alike. Both have simply buried the memory of the deadly covid epidemic. Only about 17 percent of American adults and a little less than 8 percent of children have come forward to get updated vaccination, according to CDC survey data.
Getting vaccinated is the smart thing to do. The new covid vaccines effectively produce lots of antibodies against HV.1 and slightly fewer – but enough — against JN.1. A person who has been vaccinated will NOT wind up in the hospital … or the morgue. It’s also a smart idea to get a double hit: covid shot in one arm and flu shot in the other.
In the USA, the FDA has authorized three vaccine options for 2023-2024: one mRNA shot each from Moderna and Pfizer, and a protein-based non-mRNA shot from Novavax.
People with insurance won’t have to shell out and even those without insurance can get a free shot. Check out this website. [https://www.vaccines.gov/ ]. The updated covid vaccine is recommended by the CDC for everyone ages 6 months and older. It is now widely available at pharmacies, clinics and hospitals.
A person who has covid looks and feels just about the same as a person who has flu or RSV or even plainold common cold. The only way to identify for sure which virus is responsible is to get tested. All covid tests – including PCR tests performed by a health care provider and rapid at-home antigen tests – will detect
HV.1 and JN.1. Getting tested is especially important for high-risk groups — people over the age of 65, those who are immunocompromised or who have underlying health conditions.
Paxlovid and other anti-virals can bust a covid infection and they work on all variants, including HV.1 and JN.1, but they work best when within five days of symptom onset. Early detection is key and that means testing.
As of Nov. 20, the US federal government is once again allowing households to order four free tests on the website https://www.covid.gov/tools-and-resources/resources/tests or by calling 1-800-232-0233 (TTY 1-888-720-7489). People who didn’t order a round of tests earlier this fall, can place a double order for eight free tests. The tests are delivered by mail via the U.S. Postal Service. People who still have a stockpile of tests sitting around, should check the expiration date and whether it’s been extended by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.