A variant of the coronavirus that carries some of the same mutations as the highly contagious British variant could have been in the US since October and is already widespread, suggests a re-analysis of tests over 2 m
Genome sequencing to confirm whether the variant observed in Americans is the same as the so-called B117 variant currently circulating in the United Kingdom is ongoing.
The results are expected in a few days, but the revelations have raised new questions about the origin of the modified virus, including a small possibility that it started in the US, not in the UK or elsewhere. The variant has also been found in at least 17 countries, including South Korea, Spain, Australia and Canada.
“It wouldn’t be at all surprising if at least some of the cases were B117,” said Eric Topol, head of the Scripps Research Translational Institute in La Jolla, California, who was not involved in the research but whose team confirmed a Californian case. variant B117 on Wednesday.
“He’s probably been here for a while now – but you don’t see him until you look for him.”
The existence of a new and highly transmissible Sars CoV-2 variant was announced by the UK Secretary of Health on December 14, after Covid testing laboratories reported that a growing number of positive samples lacked a signal from one of their three PCR genes. tests are used to confirm the presence of the virus.
Subsequent sequencing revealed that such an “abandonment of the S gene” was the result of mutations in the gene encoding the spike protein that the virus uses to enter human cells. The version is believed to have been circulating in the UK since September.
News of the new variant has led to travel restrictions in several countries in the UK – or, in the case of the US, requiring travelers to prove evidence of a negative Covid-19 test to be allowed in the country. However, the first known cases in the US were detected earlier this week in Colorado and California, and the suspicion is that it could already be widespread.
In the last hours of December 31, a third American state, Florida, officially reported a case of coronavirus, a twenty-year-old man from Martin County, north of West Palm Beach, who had no recent history of trip, said the department.
To investigate, scientists at California DNA testing company Helix examined the prevalence of S-gene abandonment among 2 million Covid tests the company has processed in recent months. They observed an increase in S gene dropout among positive samples in early October, when 0.25% of positive tests showed this pattern.
It has risen since then, averaging 0.5% last week – although Massachusetts, which has the largest number of such samples, currently stands at 1.85%, although no cases have yet been reported. B117 in that state.
Subsequent analysis revealed mutations in some of the same regions of the S gene that are also present in variant B117 – although a complete sequencing of the viral genome is required to confirm whether it is indeed the same variant or something else.
The coronavirus pandemic is out of control in the US, with more than 3,740 deaths in 24 hours earlier this week, marking the worst outbreak in the country.
Public health experts and Joe Biden, the democratically elected president, have warned that the situation will get worse before it improves, even as vaccines go into circulation.
Helix is currently working with the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), awaiting test results for the variant found in the US.
“It simply came to our notice then [B117 variant]”then we might be able to see if it was introduced to the United States once or more or if it has moved on,” said Nicole Washington, associate director of research at Helix, whose research was published as pre-printing and has not yet been evaluated by colleagues.
“If all the samples have it, it’s probably been here for a while, but if they only have one or two samples, it may have been introduced recently and we’ll be at the beginning to see it spread.”
It is also possible that the variant will originate in the US and then spread to the UK – although this is unlikely, given that variant B117 appears to be more widespread in England, Topol said. “However, I don’t think it should be known as the UK version, because we don’t know where it came from.”
If the B117 is indeed widely established in the US, travel bans are unlikely to work, Topol added: “It is possible that the variant will become dominant. [within the US] in the next few months, so what we need to do is overcome it through a combination of very strict mitigation measures, including surveillance and testing, and vaccination as if it were not tomorrow, ”he said. “Vaccines should work well.”
Even though the variant identified by Helix is not B117, the nature of the mutations it contains is worrying because it can increase the virus’s ability to infect human cells, added Ravi Gupta, a professor of clinical microbiology at the University of Cambridge, UK. helped sequence B117.
In the meantime, the US has far exceeded the targets set by the US government for the number of people it hopes to be vaccinated by the end of 2020.
Leading U.S. infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci on Thursday called on the federal government to use more resources to vaccinate Americans.
As the overburdened state public health departments rushed to administer the vaccines, some elderly citizens waited overnight to receive their first dose in Florida.
“We would have liked to see how it works without problems and to have 20 doses in people … by the end of 2020, which was the projection. Obviously it didn’t happen and that’s disappointing, “Fauci told NBC on Thursday.