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“the summer wave of FLiRT variants is here”

Summary:
By r.j. sigmund  FLiRT variants no one seems to be talking about it, but Covid is worse than ever, even if it’s not as deadly . . . among the CDC’s “early indicators“, “test positivity”, or the percentage of tests for Covid that were positive, rose to 16.3% during the week ending July 27th, up from 14.3% the prior week, and up from 3.4% nine weeks ago . . . test positivity is now the highest it’s been in 2 1/2 years . . . at the same time, Covid cases accounted for 2.2% of hospital emergency room patients, up from 1.9% of emergency patients during the week ending July 13th, and up from 0.4% nine weeks earlier . . . the CDC’s map on that shows a wide range; hospitals in Florida are seeing 4.1% of emergency rooms patients for Covid. while just

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by r.j. sigmund 

  • Biobot’s national wastewater network showed very low national concentrations of influenza A & B and RSV during week 30, while the rate of SARS-CoV-2 concentration increase began to slow. The Northeast is the only region that experienced an increase in SARS-CoV-2 concentrations in week 30, with all other regions holding steady. These trends might signal that we are nearing the peak of the summer surge. Nationally, major clinical metrics remained low for influenza and RSV in week 29, while metrics for COVID-19 remained elevated.  
  • Wastewater data show that COVID-19 activity and community viral load slightly increased during week 30, but that the rate of increase has slowed. It is too early to tell if we are at or near the peak for this summer surge. The national average SARS-CoV-2 wastewater concentration is now 620 copies per mL.
  • SARS-CoV-2 wastewater concentrations held steady in the South during week 30, currently at 564 copies per mL. Georgia and Tennessee are the two Southern states in COVID-NET. In good news, Georgia continued to experience a decrease in the COVID-19 hospitalization rate in week 29, while Tennessee held steady. Overall, the hospitalizations rates in both states are low.
  • COVID-19: SARS-CoV-2 wastewater concentrations held steady in the Midwest during week 30, currently at 694 copies per mL. Michigan, Minnesota, and Ohio are Midwestern states in COVID-NET. In week 29, the hospitalization rates in Minnesota decreased while rates in Michigan and Ohio held steady. Hospitalization rates remained low overall in these states.
  • SARS-CoV-2 wastewater concentrations continued to increase in the Northeast during week 30, currently at 808 copies per mL. In week 29, the Northeastern states in COVID-NET, Connecticut, Maryland, and New York, all experienced decreases in COVID-19 hospitalization rates, which remained low overall.
  •   During week 30, SARS-CoV-2 wastewater concentrations held steady in the West, currently at 516 copies per mL. California, Colorado, New Mexico, Oregon, and Utah are Western states in COVID-NET. California finally experienced a big decline in hospitalization rates, which are now down from 5 per 100,000 persons in week 28 to 2.9 per 100,000 persons in week 29. Hospitalizations rates also decreased in Colorado and Oregon, and held steady in New Mexico and Utah in week 29.

i also want to note the LP.1 variant, which is an offspring of KP.1.1.3, because it has also increased, from 3.7% of our national sample two weeks ago to 4.5% of the total currently . . . LP.1 has an additional mutation (S:S31del) in addition to the substitutions present in KP.2 and KP.3 that designate them as FLiRT variants (distinguished by a substitution of F for L at position 456 and R for T at position 346 on the virus spike protein), and both LP.1 and KP.2.3 exhibited higher infectivity and more robust immune resistance than KP.2 . . . that’s relevant because the new vaccine that’s under development is being designed to target KP.2 . . . so i asked Microsoft’s AI gadget about that, and about the new dominant KP.3.1.1 strain . . . a copy of my questions and the responses that i received is pasted below..

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