China News Service, February 25. According to foreign media reports, two groups of researchers have discovered that a local variant of the new coronavirus is spreading rapidly in New York City, USA. The mutation carried by the strain is worrying because the mutation may weaken the current vaccine. Effectiveness, or make the virus infection rate higher.
According to the US "New York Times" report, this new variant of the new coronavirus named B.1.526 first appeared in samples collected in New York City in November last year, and has spread rapidly in the city for several months, worrying researchers.
On November 9, 2020 local time, people on the streets of Manhattan, New York City, USA.
Photo by China News Agency reporter Liao Pan
According to reports, researchers at the California Institute of Technology have discovered an increase in B.1.526 variants by scanning thousands of mutations in viral gene sequences in a database called GISAID.
Researchers from the hospital found that the frequency of mutations in both genes of the mutant strains is increasing: one is the E484K mutation, which is believed to help the new coronavirus partially evade the vaccine; the other is the mutation named S477N, which may It will optimize the process of new coronavirus binding to human cells, which may increase the infection rate.
Researchers at Columbia University took a different approach.
They sequenced 1,142 samples from the University Medical Center.
They found that 12% of infected people were infected with a mutant virus containing the E484K mutation.
Patients with this mutant virus are about six years older than the average age of patients, and they are more likely to be hospitalized.
According to the New York Times, California Institute of Technology researchers published research on this new variant online on the 23rd.
The report written by Columbia University researchers has not yet been made public.
Neither of these studies have been peer-reviewed and have not been published in scientific journals.
But experts say that consistent results show that the spread of this variant is real.
Some experts said that the sudden appearance of virus variants is worrying.
"This is not particularly pleasant news," said Michel Nussenzweig, an immunologist at Rockefeller University, who is more worried about the (this) variant that appeared in New York. The virus, not the mutant virus that spread rapidly in California.
Researchers at Columbia University also stated that they have issued an alert to the New York State and New York City authorities and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Their researchers sequence about 100 viral genetic samples every day to monitor the increase in mutation.
According to statistics from Johns Hopkins University in the United States, at present, the cumulative number of confirmed new crown cases in the United States has exceeded 28.33 million, with more than 500,000 deaths.