Ohio researchers announced on Wednesday that they had identified two variants of the coronavirus that probably originated in the United States.
One of the new strains was identified in a single patient in the state, “so the researchers still don’t know the prevalence of the strain in the population,” according to the Ohio State Wexner Medical Center, where the researchers first identified the variants.
This new variant “carries a mutation identical to the United Kingdom strain, but it probably appeared in a strain of virus already present in the United States,” officials said.
In addition, the researchers also discovered what was described as an “evolving strain with three new mutations” that became “the dominant virus in Columbus over a three-week period in late December 2020 and January.”
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“This new Columbus strain has the same genetic structure as previous cases that we studied, but these three mutations represent a significant evolution,” said Dr. Dan Jones, vice president of the molecular pathology division and lead author of the study, in a declaration. “We know that this change did not come from the United Kingdom or the South African branches of the virus.”
The Columbus variant was named COH.20G / 501Y, they said.
The results were published as a BioRxiv prepress server and have not yet been peer-reviewed.
Researchers at the medical center identified the new strains by sequencing the genome of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which they have been doing since the beginning of the pandemic in an effort to maintain control over the “evolution of the virus”, they said.
“Like the UK strain, mutations detected in both viruses affect the spikes that pierce the surface of SARS-Cov-2. The spikes allow the virus to attach to and enter human cells. Like the UK strain, mutations in the Columbus strain are likely to make the virus more infectious, making it easier for the virus to pass from person to person, “according to researchers at the university.
The experts expressed concern that the mutations could affect the effectiveness of existing COVID-19 vaccines and therapies. However, “we have no data to believe that these mutations will have any impact on the effectiveness of the vaccines in use,” said Peter Mohler, co-author of the study and scientific director at the Ohio State Wexner Medical Center and vice president of research at the Faculty of Medicine , in a statement.
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“It is important not to overreact to this new variant until we get additional data,” continued Mohler. “We need to understand the impact of mutations on virus transmission, the prevalence of the strain in the population and whether it has a more significant impact on human health.”
Monitoring the evolution of the virus will be critical to understanding how the mutations affect how doctors diagnose and treat the virus, he said.
“Viruses mutate naturally and evolve over time, but the changes seen in the past two months were more prominent than in the early months of the pandemic,” added Jones.