I think this misunderstands what a "cold" is. Merely being a respiratory infection doesn't make something a cold. We call something a cold when it's 1) a mild upper respiratory infection that 2) is viral, but 3) is not specifically attributable.
There are colds caused by influenza viruses, but because "the common cold is defined on the basis of its clinical presentation, a mild influenza infection can accurately be diagnosed as a cold, meaning that the two infections are not completely distinct disease entities."[0] Once someone with a cold tests positive for the flu, though, we would generally correct the description to a mild case of the flu and no longer say they have a cold.
This is a pretty interesting hypothesis. Maybe there’s nothing really special about SARS type coronaviruses besides their novelty.
Is it possible that all coronaviruses, including the ones that cause a common cold, have a similar morbidity profile to COVID? Very minor infection in the young or those with previous exposure, extremely deadly in the old and naive. Except we all catch a bunch of colds in childhood, so nobody has to worry about a cold wiping out nursing homes.
No it's not possible. The thing that makes Sars-Cov-2 unique is its binding site in the human body. Sars-Cov-2 binds to the ACE2 receptor, which is found in just about every organ in your body. Unlike many other viruses which target receptors more localized to e.g. your throat/airway, Sars-Cov-2 can infect cells in your nasal cavity, stomach, lungs, heart, olfactory neurons, you name it. And every cell it infects will be destroyed; either by bursting to release the viral replicas, or by an immune system response.
I'm not sure that damage to various organs around the body beyond respiratory system is that a unique of a property - see myocarditis and the like related to influenza infection, which is a significant cause of mortality.
Seasonal flu is multiple different strains that can exchange genetic material, as contrasted with COVID that doesn't have different strains but small mutations
I have been saying this for many years, and have been condescended to a lot (by friends, even) for saying it.
We clearly don’t have the faintest understanding of the long-term dynamics of something like SARS, when all the conventional model parameters go to such extremes. And when the disease is evolving. And when people retreat inside and stop getting sun. And so on.
I'm unclear what the specific claim that he's been making for years exactly is - that coronaviruses have a morbidity profile similar to COVID, from the GP? Or that we can't believe long term dynamics for disease models because the parameters go to extremes?
Paraphrasing: “The academics who claim that we narrowly avoided a SARS/etc holocaust, have a fatal conflict of interest, and are completely full of shit.”
Yes that's possible, at least for some other coronavirus. HCoV-OC43 is an endemic betacoronavirus very similar to SARS-CoV-2. It typically causes common cold symptoms in healthy people but is extremely dangerous to the elderly.
> The common cold, also known simply as a cold, is a viral infectious disease of the upper respiratory tract that primarily affects the respiratory mucosa of the nose, throat, sinuses, and larynx.
further down,
> Well over 200 virus strains are implicated in causing the common cold, with rhinoviruses being the most common.[13]
That link appears to be about the flu, not the common cold. They're different, but something I've learned over the past year is that most people think of the flu as another name for the common cold.
Here in Britain at least, having 'the flu' is basically having a particularly miserable cold - rather than a bout of influenza which fills the lungs with fluids and decimates armies.
I'm not sure this will really add anything to the discussion, but I think the common usage of the term "cold" is for an endemic, mostly-harmless disease, not just any viral respiratory illness.
Also, my quick read of that paper was that it was mostly concerned with immunocompromised individuals, and with secondary pneumonia infections. Secondary pneumonia is certainly a problem for old people, or otherwise vulnerable people with colds. Antibiotics can be pretty helpful but they have limitations.
I hate statements like this because even if they’re true they end up in the average person’s hands who’ll claim “COVID is just a cold” like they do with “evolution is just a theory.”
No. Colds are upper respiratory tract infections and only affect the nose and throat, as opposed to viral pneumonia. Different coronaviruses have different proteins and corresponding cell receptors (ACE2, DPP4, etc), which result in different organs being infected. Saying that all coronavirus diseases are colds is about as accurate as saying that all coronavirus diseases are SARS.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1889–1890_pandemic