Vietnam has detected a new variant that is a combination of B.1.617.2 (Indian) and B.1.1.7 (UK) COVID19 variants and spreads quickly by air.
Authorities in Vietnam have detected a new coronavirus variant that is a combination of B.1.617.2 (Indian) and B.1.1.7 (UK) variants and spreads quickly by air, the Vietnamese health minister said on Saturday.
It is to be noted that the World Health Organisation (WHO) on Monday announced that it will be using Greek letters as labels for key coronavirus variants instead of where the variant was first detected.
WHO calls the 'UK variant' (B.1.1.7) 'Alpha', and the B.1.617.2 variant, first found in India is 'Delta'.
Health Minister Nguyen Thanh Long said that scientists identified the variant while examining the genetic makeup of the virus that had infected some recent patients.
New variant much more transmissible
The variant is much more transmissible, especially in the air and viral cultures in the laboratory have revealed that the virus replicated itself very quickly, the health minister said.
The Ministry of Health would announce the new coronavirus variant on the global genome map, he added, saying that the new variant is not named yet.
Long said the new variant has spread to 30 of Vietnam's 63 municipalities and provinces, and could be responsible for a recent surge in confirmed cases.
Four variants of global concern
The World Health Organization (WHO) has identified four variants of SARS-CoV-2 of global concern. These include variants that emerged first in India, Britain, South Africa and Brazil.
WHO calls the 'UK variant' (B.1.1.7) 'Alpha', the 'South African variant' (B.1.351) 'Beta', P1 variant which was first detected in Brazil 'Gamma' and the B.1.617.2 variant, first found in India 'Delta'.
Delta, deemed as a variant of concern by WHO, may be both more transmissible and harder to neutralise by antibodies raised against previous variants.
Alpha, on the other hand, is believed to be more transmissible than ordinary strains.
Vietnam COVID-19 cases
After successfully containing the virus for most of last year, Vietnam is grappling with a rise in infections since late April that accounts for more than half of the total 6,856 registered cases. So far, there have been 47 deaths.
The Southeast Asian country has, so far, recorded the presence of seven coronavirus variants: B.1.222, B.1.619, D614G, B.1.1.7, B.1.351, A.23.1 and B.1.617.2.
(With inputs from agencies)
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