Attached is a PDF showing the spatiotemporal progression of the Dela SARS-CoV-2 variant in Europe from late 2021 to early March 2022. It shows an increase in latitude of about 0.65 deg/day and a full-width half-maximum (FWHM) of about 32 days.
My interpretation:
The spread north is slow but steady.
The FWHM of 32 days may be due to the variant rapidly spreading through a population,
infecting increasing numbers of people until many have died or developed immunity,
then decreases.
This seems to be the case for other variants as well.
I am looking for other researchers who would like to help develop this finding into a journal manuscript.
Hello William Burgess Grant
Thank you for starting a very thought provoking discussion. I have no doubt I am not clever and analytical enough to work out such things.
I ask a question (or three) in return: how does this compare to other variants that are well popularised in the media? How does it compare on other continents? Is this how to measure variants in the future (and can estimate how serious etc)?
Dear Dr. Grant!
You raised an important issue - variants of COVID-19. I am especially worried about brand new variants that might have been undetected and only become visible when it is already too late to stop them from spreading out. The war in Ukraine renders Eastern Europe an ideal "incubator" for a newcomer variant. I am certain you should be able to find partners from China, Israel and Japan to embark on a new research project:
1) Ou, J., Lan, W., Wu, X. et al. Tracking SARS-CoV-2 Omicron diverse spike gene mutations identifies multiple inter-variant recombination events. Sig Transduct Target Ther 7, 138 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41392-022-00992-2, Open access: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41392-022-00992-2
2) Michael Le Page, Should we worry about different variants of the coronavirus merging? New Scientist, Volume 254, Issue 3381, 2022, Citation:" "Deltacron” variants of coronavirus pose a threat, finds Michael Le Page, but they aren't the worst-case scenario...." Available at: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S026240792200598X
One person you could turn to is Mr. Adrian Mulligan, Research Director for Customer Insights at Elsevier. He has published an article recently and has lots of quality contacts:
Adrian Mulligan 2022. The future of research revealed - Researchers lay bare the challenges and opportunities they face in a post-COVID world, April 20, 2022, available at: https://www.elsevier.com/connect/research-futures-2022
Yours sincerely, Bulcsu Szekely
Dear William Burgess Grant . See the following useful link: https://europepmc.org/article/ppr/ppr435199
Kindly see also the following useful link: https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/en/news-events/sars-cov-2-delta-variant-now-dominant-european-region
Also check please the following useful link: Article Spatiotemporal Analysis for COVID-19 Delta Variant Using GIS...
Thanks for the valuable suggetions.
I will follow up on them
William