Dr. Michael Osterholm Debunks COVID Misconceptions

Epidemiologist Dr. Michael Osterholm has been baffled by a few things regarding COVID-19. Specifically, where and why it spreads geographically. He doesn't see rhyme or reason why early strains hit some places and avoided others. But he knows that the Delta Variant is everywhere. He goes on to clear up some misconceptions that doctors believed at the beginning of the pandemic that turned out to be not true.

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Osterholm: and what this virus is doing is it's just basically making the rounds of the earth. and some places get hit multiple times some places don't. I don't know why India went almost eight months with almost no activity. and then became the hottest place on the earth. That's been a challenge for us to understand. I don't understand why last spring when this b117 or alpha bearing we call it now landed in the united states it didn't do what it was doing around the world. It just hit Minnesota and Michigan. Now look at what's happening. Delta is hitting everywhere. so it really isn't a function as much as the host in terms of whether you get it or not. if you have underlying health conditions. if you're older if you're obese or heavier. These are all risk factors for getting the severe disease but not necessarily getting the disease.

Sam: Speaking of risk factors and then I want to ask about that sort of like the lack of predictability associated with this but in terms of risk factors. What do we now know in terms of risk? initially, I think asthma people were very concerned about asthma. but as we went on my understanding and please correct me if I'm wrong asthma didn't end up being associated with a higher propensity. but what about diabetes seems to be very problematic and correct me when I'm wrong here.

Osterholm: Oh you're right you're absolutely right yep

Sam: What about downs syndrome? Do we know if that is more associated with at this point?

Osterholm: We don't have any evidence that that is more associated but you're right and we're learning more about these, a lot of these are interacting factors. and what I mean by that is if I'm older, if I'm heavier and I have a condition, does that even put me at greater risk than if I'm younger and don't have you know a weight issue and then I have a condition. One of the challenges we have of course is that at one age one's immune system becomes less effective. or in some cases, they're out of whack and so you have to take medication to actually reduce your immune response like certain kinds of arthritis, etc. which then, in turn, can dumb down the immune response in a positive way for your condition but in a negative way if you get exposed to covid. and so that's the challenge we have right now is trying to deal with all that. but I can tell you right now the major risk factors are age. and obesity. and immune-compromised immune-deficient status. Those are the three primary drivers.