https://doi.org/10.1140/epjb/s10051-024-00733-0
Regular Article - Statistical and Nonlinear Physics
Why and how did the COVID pandemic end abruptly?
1
Computational Modeling, CIMATEC, Av. Orlando Gomes 1845 (Piat̄a), 41650-010, Salvador, BA, Brazil
2
DCET-Physics, UNEB, Av. Silveira Martins 2555, 41195-001, Salvador, BA, Brazil
3
Department of Physics and Astronomy, Rutgers University, Piscataway, NJ, USA
b
jcphillips.physics@gmail.com
Received:
22
February
2024
Accepted:
17
June
2024
Published online:
14
August
2024
Phase transition theory, implemented quantitatively by thermodynamic scaling, has explained the evolution of Coronavirus’ extremely high contagiousness caused by a few key mutations from CoV2003 to CoV2019 identified among hundreds, as well as the later 2021 evolution to Omicron caused by 30 mutations. It also showed that the 2022 strain BA.5 with five mutations began a new path. Here we show that the early 2023 strains BKK with one stiffening mutation confirm that path, and the single flexing mutation of a later 2023 variant EG.5 strengthens it further. The few mutations of the new path have greatly reduced pandemic deaths, for mechanical reasons proposed here.
Marcelo A. Moret and James C. Phillips contributed equally to this work.
© The Author(s) 2024
Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
