40% of whitetail deer had a SARS-CoV2 infection by March 2021. https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.29.454326v1 I’d expect it to be predominantly Delta in them too by now. Given the population and reproduction rate of deer, I’d expect the virus to keep circulating in deer indefinitely.
I love this response partly because it addresses something mechanistic about the world. Once the mechanism is raised it suggests things like: maybe the deer need vaccines? Or to be culled?
My central hunch for deer is that they are more exposed to humans (because of our garbage) than vice versa.
But like: listing out the aspects of the problem (deer, air travel, human trafficking, etc) and then listing sufficient sets of interventions to address all the aspects adequately… Is it really THAT expensive, compared with not eradicating?
It will be a different kind of eradication than smallpox eradication then, which is our golden standard for virus eradication. More like rabies management. Not zero cases forever, but small numbers of cases which are managed by vaccination where needed.
40% of whitetail deer had a SARS-CoV2 infection by March 2021. https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.29.454326v1 I’d expect it to be predominantly Delta in them too by now. Given the population and reproduction rate of deer, I’d expect the virus to keep circulating in deer indefinitely.
I love this response partly because it addresses something mechanistic about the world. Once the mechanism is raised it suggests things like: maybe the deer need vaccines? Or to be culled?
My central hunch for deer is that they are more exposed to humans (because of our garbage) than vice versa.
But like: listing out the aspects of the problem (deer, air travel, human trafficking, etc) and then listing sufficient sets of interventions to address all the aspects adequately… Is it really THAT expensive, compared with not eradicating?
It will be a different kind of eradication than smallpox eradication then, which is our golden standard for virus eradication. More like rabies management. Not zero cases forever, but small numbers of cases which are managed by vaccination where needed.