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Comment by null_object | Hacker News Reader

A lot of these articles (seeing many in the same vein) seem to be implying that viruses are all making some vengeful comeback after the caution (some of us) exercised during the pandemic, but I'm not sure what scientific basis they are built on?

Some of the patterns we're seeing are surely just a statistical anomaly - the general dip in these infections when people weren't as exposed to each other's germs over the last couple years is now mirrored by a modest increase.

And naturally the news organizations want to pump every possible scenario that might lead to more doom-scrolling and eyeballs on ads.

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> I'm not sure what scientific basis they are built on

The article mentions the flu. Flu cases have been way down for the last two years, so it's reasonably to assume our collective immunity to it is also down.

You might be right about Monkeypox and the hepatitis we're seeing in kids. Those could just be random, but the immunity debt hypothesis also fits.

No doubt a lot of it is reverting to the mean actions in place. But, that generally portrays as a rebound on low values, so I can see why it is seen as a "vengeance."

The article does a decent coverage of the different mechanisms that could be at play, as well.

> The article does a decent coverage of the different mechanisms that could be at play

I thought the 'scientific' mechanisms were clutching at straws tbh: "And that increase in susceptibility, experts suggest, means we may experience some wonkiness as we work toward a new post-pandemic equilibrium with the bugs that infect us."

In addition I think it'll always be possible to find 'experts' who will supply a handy quote to reinforce the essential nature of their particular area of expertise.

Oh, to be clear, I agree it was clutching at straws. But it did a good job of listing all of the straws that it could, and studies/time will hopefully let us know which ones mattered.

One problem is that a lot of people in the field are very specialized in just one part of the spectrum. For example Marion Koopmans knows a lot about virusses but doesn't know a lot about immunology. That is totally ok, but also means that her view is limited and is very focused on viruses.

I think this article was fairly careful to not do that.

I could read it thinking that no more people will get sick next season then would get sick through three usual seasons anyways. And the danger comes more from piling up the cases not from any increase in severity of the diseases or number of people getting sick altogether.

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