Vietnam Detects a COVID-19 Variant That’s a Hybrid of Variants from UK & India

By
Tan Shi Hui
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Remember how early this month, it was reported that the virus that caused COVID-19 has mutated 6,600 times?

Well, apparently these mutations have been “dating”, for a new hybrid of variants was found in Vietnam.

Vietnam Detects a COVID-19 Variant That’s a Hybrid of Variants from UK & India

On 29 May, Vietnam health minister Nguyen Thanh Long revealed that a new variant of COVID-19 has emerged. It is a mix of the COVID-19 variants (of concern) from India and the United Kingdom and it is allegedly airborne, as reported by online newspaper VnExpress.

After successfully containing the virus for most of 2020, Vietnam is now battling an outbreak that is spreading furiously.

Almost 3,600 were infected in 31 of its 63 cities since April. This account for more than half of Vietnam’s total infections.

“After running gene sequencing on newly detected patients, we have discovered a new variant that is a mix of India and UK ones.

“More specifically, it is an Indian variant with mutations that originally belong to the UK variant,” Nguyen Thanh Long said.

VnExpress quoted Long as saying Vietnam would announce the newly discovered variant to the world soon.

Previously, the country reported 7 virus variants:

  • B1222
  • B1619
  • D614G
  • B117 (the variant from the UK)
  • B1351
  • A231
  • B16172 (the variant from India)

To know more about why viruses mutate, watch this video to the end:

New Variant Much More Transmissible

The new variant replicates itself swiftly and is much more transmissible than the previously known types. This is why so many new cases are popping up in different locations in such a short period.

So far, Vietnam has reported 6,396 coronavirus cases with 47 deaths.

So far, the World Health Organization (WHO) identified four variants of SARS-CoV-2 of global concern. The variants first emerged in India, Britain, South Africa and Brazil.

Officials at the WHO has yet to respond to the variant identified in Vietnam.

Vietnam Getting More Vaccine

In order to protect the population, Vietnam’s government was working to secure 10 million vaccine doses under the COVAX cost-sharing scheme. Additionally, they will be getting a further 20 million doses of Pfizer-BioNTech’s vaccine and 40 million of Russia’s Sputnik V.

As of May, the country of about 98 million people has received 2.9 million doses of vaccines. They aim to secure 150 million this year.

In case you’re curious about the origin of the variants before they become one, here is some information:

Variant from UK 

The variant from UK, B117, was first discovered near the end of 2020. It was not the first mutation to be found and it may be more infectious.

This new mutated coronavirus is alarming the authorities for three main reasons:

  • this variant is unusually highly mutated, and these mutations affect part of the virus likely to be important
  • some of these mutations have been shown in the lab to increase its infectiousness
  • it’s quickly replacing other versions of the virus

Here in Singapore, there are various community cases that were infected by this strain. You can read more about the B117 variant here.

Variant from India

The variant from India, B16172 that recently made headlines for an unusual reason was also first detected last year in October. It has since spread to over 40 other countries.

Recently, the WHO labelled this variant as a ‘Variant of Concern” as

  • They are more transmissible
  • They are more deadly
  • They are able to break through a vaccine’s defences

You can read more about that here.

Featured Image: Vietnam Stock Images/ Shutterstock.com

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Tan Shi Hui
Email: [email protected]