The Wuhan Corona Virus

[Ed Hurst]

I'm reading statistics about this plague. One of the biggest problems in getting straight info is the long lead time between exposure and symptoms -- roughly 3-4 weeks. There is also a big disparity between symptoms and positive identification of the cause.

That said, a few things stand out. (1) It appears to hit Chinese folks harder due to genetic factors having to do with ACE2 receptors in the lungs, which is the attack route the virus uses. Euro descendants seldom have many of those receptors. It is predicted to hit American Natives hard for historical reasons of correlation with Asian genetic predisposition. (2) Some reports have said it's hitting Wuhan hardest out the rest of China, and not just because that's where it began, but for similar genetic clustering factors. (3) Most of the folks dying so far are elderly men with significant health compromises before exposure. A major statistical factor is deficiency in Vitamin D (and sun exposure), as well as selenium, both of which are well established as problems in the Wuhan area.

Virtually none of this is widely published, but despite being mere correlations (not causes), it is more solid than what is being reported.

[jaybreak]

It is predicted to hit American Natives hard for historical reasons of correlation with Asian genetic predisposition.

Do you mean American Natives, as in indigenous Americans? It's annoying that the language gets so muddled concerning this.

This all reminds me of this obnoxious meme, which is a demonstrably false statement. It's decent rhetoric, but it doesn't explain why "having the same skeleton" is a positive thing to begin with.

[Ed Hurst]

Yeah, I used a modified common term (reversing the order of the words), but indigenous folks in North America is what I meant. Their DNA seems to overlap a great deal with Asians, and the farther north you go in America, the more so. The tribes in Alaska all come a lot closer to Asians, and the Inuit more than anyone else.

[jaybreak]

Yeah, I used a modified common term (reversing the order of the words), but indigenous folks in North America is what I meant. Their DNA seems to overlap a great deal with Asians, and the farther north you go in America, the more so. The tribes in Alaska all come a lot closer to Asians, and the Inuit more than anyone else.

This makes intuitive sense. I'm thinking one of the factors could be the climate, if the northern North American climate was similar to some of the Asian climates, those populations would settle more there. The ones that moved farther south, where it's warmer, might select for genetic outliers (or groups that were in warmer areas in Asia), that did better there. I dunno.

[Ed Hurst]

All we have is the Bering Land Bridge postulation. Earlier groups came over and headed to South America. The Inuit were the most recent bunch and didn't get very far south before the Europeans colonized and locked down the migration.