WALKING INTO THE EYE OF THE STORM

Long ago I learned that things that are terrifying can often be dispersed by walking through them.  For instance, the boy across the street — a mischief-maker on whom I had a crush — told me that there was a kind of bats in our neighborhood that had headlights and used them to seek out victims.  They would tangle in my hair, the pride and joy of that red-headed girl with curls and cause me to have to have my head shaved.  Then he used a small flashlight to terrorize me, much to the delight of my little brothers.  I really WAS terrified.  But it was fake, imaginary, an invention.  In the end I found out.

Though since then it has lost me friends and relatives, I remain convinced that the best way to handle a threat is to face it and walk through it.  I’m doing that with this variously named “new” corona virus, which has been called SARS-2 (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome — curse acronyms anyway), Covid-19 (Corona Virus of the year 2019) and Nouveau Corona Virus (New Crown-shaped virus).  The following link is my latest set of clues.  

https://www.webmd.com/lung/news/20200423/the-great-invader-how-covid-attacks-every-organ?ecd=soc_tw_200502_cons_news_attackseveryorgan&linkId=100000012063445

I’m posting this for Sunday, so to give it a religious twist (for those whose holy day is Sunday) I’ll tell you a story about Alexandra David-Neal, one of the most amazing women of the Twenties.   “Alexandra David-Néel was a Belgian–French explorer, spiritualist, Buddhist, anarchist and writer. She is most known for her 1924 visit to Lhasa, Tibet, when it was forbidden to foreigners.”  Following Tibetan holy solitaries, she lived in a cave where she was visited by others who were doing the same and who told her about dragon ghosts.  One day she looked down the access path and saw a dragon coming to visit.  Rather than hiding in the back of the cave, she marched out to meet it and put her hand out to touch it.  Her hand went on through, as though it were made of water vapor.  Maybe that’s what it really was.  (She's in Wikipedia and wrote 30 books.)

So I’m putting out a hand to see about this viral tsunami.  Following the article linked above and taking in a bit at a time, I’m now going to see whether I can understand “Angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2)” by reducing it to ordinary words.  I’m getting my info from Wikipedia.  I must say that my complaint about Wikipedia has been that it is “edited” (dominated) by arrogant white men from an elite culture that gets everyone else’s story wrong, but when it comes to this sort of stuff, it’s their game.

ACE2 is an enzyme. “An enzyme is a substance that acts as a catalyst in living organisms, regulating the rate at which chemical reactions proceed without itself being altered in the process.; The biological processes that occur within all living organisms are chemical reactions, and most are regulated by enzymes.” (Britannica)  In the case of this virus, it attaches to the cell membranes of organs and on the linings of all the tubing systems, like blood or neural networks or the lungs, so it can travel through the body.  ACE2, one of several versions of this enzyme, controls blood pressure by vasoconstriction operating in tension with a vasodilator.  Many mechanisms of the body are based on homeostasis which is not about sexual orientation (homo = "same" like homogenized milk is the same throughout) but about guarding against extremes — not too much and not too little. The consequences of extremes are disease and sometimes death.

Anything vulnerable to ACE2 interference is hit by this corona virus which prefers attachment to this enzyme, then triggers symptoms on skin (rashes), in toes (covid toes) and in organs that depend on their blood supply.  It can make clots and constrictions in the brain and mess with kidney function.  In other words, it destroys the homeostasis of the body that keeps it alive.

Following are the two most technical paragraphs in the entry.

“Angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 is a zinc containing metalloenzyme located on the surface of endothelial and other cells. ACE2 protein contains an N-terminal peptidase M2 domain and a C-terminal collectrin renal amino acid transporter domain.

“ACE2 is a single-pass type I membrane protein, with its enzymatically active domain exposed on the surface of cells in lungs and other tissues. The extracellular domain of ACE2 is cleaved from the transmembrane domain by another enzyme known as sheddase, and the resulting soluble protein is released into the blood stream and ultimately excreted into urine.^”

Surprisingly, this molecule is zinc and usually is in a pouch inside the cell.  (Amazing how tinkertoy-like molecules can be.) This is why some quacks say, “take zinc” for corona viruses.  Endothelial cells, which we know as being skin, are the linings of the various tubings that distribute oxygen and other basic substances, some of them excreted by organs and balanced against each other.

The N and C terminals are about the end connections that form molecular chains to make peptides and proteins.  ACE2 has a little piece that can be cut off (cleaved) and exist independently.  “Sheddase” is the molecule that can do this.  Then the piece floats around affecting other molecules until it gets into the urine and is excreted.

An additional problem with Covid-19 is that the treatments, like ventilators, dialysis and so-on, are so blunt-force that they can do as much damage as the infection.  Some say that only half the people who get ventilators ultimately recover.  The machines are not only expensive, but they require trained operators and constant monitoring.  My health directive asks for NO ventilator or dialysis. (I’m 80.  I live alone. I taped the directive to the back door in case I die alone.)

Taste and smell functions are so sensitive to this kind of trouble that they shut down early, which makes them good first indicators. The first doc the victim sees may be an otolaryngologist — ear and throat expert. (I like the fancy word because it’s so much fun to say.)

ACE2 is a “transmembrane protein” that can let these viruses into the body of the cell. Those spikes that make the corona have a protein that gets them in through ACE2 to become part of the endosomes, the actual machinery of the cell, which is far more complex that we ever imagined.  I won’t try to explain them here, but Wikipedia discusses them.

Because vulnerability to Covid-19 is affected by what we call “race,” I want to mention Oz Hopkins, an imposing Black woman in Portland whom I should have used as a role model long ago.  The first reporter who specialized in health issues that I knew of, she was my age.  I had no idea of all the achievements noted in her obituary.  She was as intrepid in her own way as Alexandra David-Neal, unafraid to walk into the eye of the storm.

https://obits.oregonlive.com/obituaries/oregon/obituary.aspx?n=oz-hopkins-koglin&pid=179755552

THE VIRUS PLOT THICKENS

How you catch it matters.

If someone with the virus in their lungs sneezed in your face, you wiped the droplets with your hand and got some in your eyes, the process would go quickly because the amount of the virus was big and went in by a vulnerable route.

If you went into a room where a person had been speaking, emitting an aerosol/vapor into the air where it floated, and you got a few viral bits in your nose by inhaling, that infection would meet resistance from antibodies in your nostrils, and might possibly even go down your esophagus instead of your windpipe.  The esophagus goes to the stomach which is full of acid capable of dissolving pig gristle.

The state of your lungs matters.

If you were a smoker of whatever; if like me you had worked in a foundry where you inhaled fumes from molten bronze and various patina solutions, or from plaster and asbestos and hot wax; or if you froze your bronchi in a Montana winter; or if you lived in a small house with a wood stove; or if you were prone to bad colds or even pneumonia; or if you inhaled mold and fungus; the virus might find you an excellent place to set up shop.

Corona viruses afflict us all the time and we never quite get hold of them with a vaccine because they mutate all the time.  They go to lungs because that’s a way with direct contact with the world, the atmosphere with whatever it contains even if there are toxins, industrial emissions, particulates.  The lungs try to throw all the bad stuff out, hence the coughing, plus cilia (moving hairs) that form waves to carry bits out.

Time matters.

But suffocation kills quickly.  The current record for holding one’s breath is 22 minutes.  One usually goes unconscious before that. But the body will fight for relief as hard as it can.  It makes a difference how big the person is, whether by fighting they are using up blood oxygen quickly.

Political and governmental capacities and motives make a big difference in survivability.  Whether necessary supplies, people, and systems exist and are or are not put into play, can be due to smug neglect with the same result as hostile intent.

Sometimes breathing deaths are not due to disease. Nations who kill their citizens with poisonous gases are using a combination of lack of oxygen and absorption of the poison.  The advantage of such attacks is that no contact is necessary, it can be done en masse, and it does not destroy buildings and materials.  Once the bodies are gone, their things can be owned and used again.

Such a catastrophe can happen through natural events, like lakes that accumulate carbon monoxide at the bottom but are stirred up by a storm so that the gas comes on land and kills people.  Or sulphur fumes can come from a volcano or other ground vent.  Volatile fuels and combustion engines can produce carbon monoxide in a house or car.

But we’re talking about a virus, a bit of genetic code that happens to spell out suffocation.

This is a good step-by-step description.   https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/03/11/science/how-coronavirus-hijacks-your-cells.html

This vid is an even more technical version and includes many fascinating ideas by going deeper..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9A4FMpwcQM

Several research people (clear and non-technical) speak and the vid takes a long time, but offers far more global and more particular things to think about.  For instance, global warming is involved.  

Then there are particular variables like this virus being able to go deeper into the lungs and cause more inflammation.  They can cause a thing called a cytokine storm, which is a frenzied attempt to throw off the virus that becomes damaging in itself, like causing fluid leaks. Molecular bits have names and functions.  By pausing the vid and going to Google for more definition, it’s enlightening.

Different people have different ways of resisting and creating antibodies, so making vaccines may take advantage of the variety.  There’s a thing called a SPIKE protein that is one of those responses.  Other things are mentioned in this California vid and they mention how much AIDS research is helping to understand this new vid.

In terms of medicines, what works on one coronavirus may work on another.  There is a drug that might be effective for ebola but it’s not ready for wide use yet. This gave people the idea of using a malaria drug, less likely to work, but blindly promoted by Trump.  A drug may cause more mutation which can make itself obsolete. Or it could interact in a way that intensifies the bad virus.

The level of detail and knowledge of testing of various kinds, like measuring the effect of social distancing against economic thriving (it turns out that statistically, the two go together) reveals the advantage of open sharing through websites and other collaboration.  In particular through working technically on the internet, methods are moving more quickly and there is no advantage in withholding.

It’s significant that in this second vid the participants are youngsters with a leader from another country.  The old model of experts who “own” knowledge and theories, is a handicap. This shows up in vids by Vaknin, who has defended himself psychologically by holding up academic degrees and being amused by sex.  He defends against being labeled inferior by insisting that he is superior, as defined by rationality and logic.  But this means a loss of grasp, so he thinks things like HIV can only be transmitted by het intercourse.  In fact, it travels anywhere there is body fluid exchange, including blood and plasma.  For a period, transfusions were spreading AIDS.

Human psychology wants to disbelieve unseen hazards and ignore warnings.  We resist thinking about things that are new and mysterious.

Some people are so temperamentally reactive that if they are told to do something simple like stay home, they refuse.  Others like to think magically, esp. when it comes to something like religion, so they will refuse to stop meeting.  And a third category are fantasists who believe some kind of magic will make it all go away, in a scenario about miracles as encouraged by movie scripts.

A nastier point of view sees every disaster as a chance to make money and will treat the foreseen need for equipment and supplies as a stock option, so begin hoarding key items or buying a pharm company with a drug that might be convincingly peddled as a cure.  But with the really big pandemic, and the only “cure” being social distancing, the economic disaster may be the biggest money-generator yet for those without scruples.  So when top leaders have the ability to stall and postpone reactions in order to increase profits, they cause more deaths.

It begins to develop, esp. after thinking about the many connections, that we live in a sea of viruses, that with our modern transportation and penchant for travel that they move around the planet very quickly, that there are a number of animal vectors.  We already live with one of the deadliest viruses ,which is carried by animals close to us — I’m talking about rabies which is 100% fatal.  At first AIDS was even closer to us — coming from our lovers — and not quite equally as fatal.  There were people genetically immune.  Vaccines and meds control both AIDS and rabies but have not been curable.

The ideas are coming fast but social distancing — working from home and losing jobs at closed businesses — give us economic disaster alongside personal time. We will think of new ways of “making money” or living without money.  But so much loss!  Vaknin points out that there are too many people and that we tend to keep people alive who ought to be allowed to die.  There is much to think about in terms of morality.