When AstraZeneca’s first shipment of Covid-19 vaccine arrived in South Africa this month, President Cyril Ramaphosa hailed the shipment as a means of “turning the tide” against the virus.
But the growth of a dangerous variant of the coronavirus has disrupted the country’s response to the pandemic and heightened fears worldwide that mutant strains could potentially render the current generation of vaccines ineffective.
“What we’re going to see is a game of cat and mouse between changing viruses and vaccine manufacturers having to quickly change their vaccines,” said Devi Sridhar, professor of global public health at the University of Edinburgh.
“So the lesson is that we need to keep the numbers low so that we don’t see more and more emerging variants, which makes vaccination more difficult.”
Read more about this story on NBCNews.com and watch On Assignment with Richard Engel, “Covid Mutants,” aired on Sunday, February 21, at 10:00 PM Eastern Time on MSNBC.
The first signs of trouble came in October, when doctors noticed a worrying increase in the number of cases, specifically around Nelson Mandela Bay, the eastern end of the picturesque stretch of coast in South Africa known as “the garden route.
“In five weeks, scientists have identified a variant with worrying mutations in its spike protein, the part of the virus that allows it to enter human cells. Current Covid-19 vaccines target the peak protein, but mutations can make antibodies produced by vaccines less effective. Mutations can also make people who have had coronavirus more susceptible to reinfection.
“People who were previously infected with SARS-CoV-2 and who generated antibodies to this virus, these antibodies may not recognize this new variant of the virus because of changes in the spike protein,” said Richard Lessells, a leading researcher at the sequencing laboratory. genetic, KwaZulu-Natal Research Innovation and Sequencing Platform, which identified the variant.
“This means that it is possible that this variant is capable of reinfecting people, and this may be contributing to it spreading more efficiently through the population again.”
South Africa was the hardest hit country on the continent, suffering from the first wave of coronavirus that peaked in July, in the middle of winter in the southern hemisphere. The government has implemented strict blocking measures, closing borders, imposing curfews and even banning the sale of alcohol to prevent “reckless behavior” caused by alcohol.
In late September, cases fell and the government announced easing of blocking restrictions, reopening the country for tourists and business travelers. This freedom gave the new variant of the virus the space it needed to spread, accelerating a second wave that hit more strongly and faster than the first.
More than 48,000 South Africans have died of coronavirus, and the South African variant has been detected in more than 40 countries, including the United States.
Health experts warn that global vaccination efforts need to be stepped up to prevent more mutations from occurring and more variants from emerging. Another strain that emerged independently in Brazil also showed mutations similar to the South African strain, with the same potential to reinfect people who already had Covid-19.
President Joe Biden last month signed travel restrictions to ban passengers from South Africa in an attempt to control the spread of the variant. But with the number of cases still high in other countries, and the potential for third and fourth waves, the virus may continue to mutate and resist the vaccines currently available.
“We are in a race to get ahead of the virus, to reduce transmission, to vaccinate everyone in the world before the virus evolves in ways we cannot predict,” said Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome Trust, a health charity. In the United Kingdom.
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The mutations caused a serious setback in South Africa’s vaccine plans. A study of about 2,000 people indicated that the AstraZeneca vaccine is much less effective against the new variant, protecting people only 22% better than a placebo. The findings prompted the South African government to stop launching the vaccine, which was due to begin in the week of February 8.
Instead, the government moved quickly to focus on another vaccine: a single-dose injection developed by Johson & Johnson that had been tested more widely in South Africa and showed better results against the new variant. The rollout started on Wednesday with healthcare professionals as part of an “implementation study” that will monitor its effectiveness. Ramaphosa was also shot.
South Africa was then challenged with what to do with the millions of doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine that had already arrived in the country and expire at the end of April.
Health Minister Zweli Mkhize announced this week that the government had offered the unused doses to the African Union to distribute to other countries on the continent that were not hit so hard by the South African variant, saying that there would be “no waste and expense unsuccessful. “
The government said it also closed deals for the Pfizer vaccine, although a new laboratory study also cast doubt on the effectiveness of the vaccine against the South African variant, which could cause more headaches for the country.
Meanwhile, the Oxford University group that worked with AstraZeneca to develop its vaccine said it would start work on a new version designed to recognize the new variant. The scientist who led the development of the vaccine, Sarah Gilbert, a professor of vaccinology, told the BBC that the modified injection may be ready in the fall.