The snow is in front of the entrance to the Garmisch-Partenkirchen hospital. A possible new variant of the coronavirus was discovered at the Garmisch-Partenkirchen hospital. The samples are being examined at the Charité hospital in Berlin, the hospital announced on Monday.
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Germany is the last country to discover a new coronavirus mutation, with a new variant identified among a group of patients at a hospital in Bavaria.
Local media reported for the first time on Monday that an unknown variant of the coronavirus had been discovered among 35 patients at a hospital in the ski town of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, in south-eastern Germany.
The altered virus was found in 35 of the 73 people infected in the hospital, the Bavarian media BR24 reported on Monday. The samples are now being examined at the Charité university hospital in Berlin. CNBC contacted Germany’s health ministry to confirm the reports.
Officials said the variant is different from variants recently discovered in the UK and South Africa.
The hospital’s deputy medical director, Clemens Stockklausner, said at a news conference on Monday that there was still no understanding as to whether the mutation made the virus more transmissible (as with variants discovered in Britain and South Africa) ), or more deadly.
“At the moment, we have discovered a small point mutation … and it is not absolutely clear whether it will be of clinical relevance,” said Stockklausner. “We have to wait for the complete sequencing.”
Neither the British nor South African variants caused more deaths, although as a result of their ability to spread more easily, they caused more infections, hospitalizations and, unfortunately, more deaths. The United Kingdom and Ireland, in particular, witnessed a rapid spread of the mutant virus, which caused an increase in infections and left some hospitals struggling with a flow of patients.
Information about the new variant found in Germany emerged on the same day that the country’s Minister of Health, Jens Spahn, said that the current level of coronavirus sequencing in the country was not sufficient and that laboratories would be required (and compensated) to sequence coronavirus samples to monitor virus mutations.
A handful of other countries that have discovered coronavirus mutations, including the United Kingdom and South Africa, are known for their large-scale surveillance and genome sequencing of coronavirus samples.
Last week, Dr. Janosch Dahmen, a German doctor and parliamentarian from the Green Party, told CNBC that “we need a more precise crisis mode here in Germany to fight the pandemic, and I am very concerned about the numbers (of infections) it will go up much higher, as we can see in Britain and Ireland this minute. “
Infections persist
Germany’s 16 state prime ministers are due to meet Chancellor Angela Merkel on Tuesday to discuss whether to tighten or extend blocking restrictions across the country, which are expected to end. on January 31st.
Germany’s infection rate remains a significant concern, with an additional 11,369 daily cases reported by the public health agency, the Robert Koch Institute, on Tuesday. This brings the total number of cases to just over 2 million. The death toll is 47,622.
Like other European countries, Germany is eager to prevent the spread of the most infectious strains of the virus found in Britain and South Africa.
Merkel reportedly told lawmakers of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party last week that “if we fail to stop this British virus, we will have 10 times the number of cases by Easter … Wand needs another eight to 10 weeks of tough measures “, German daily newspaper Bild reported.
On Monday, Spahn insisted that people should not call the coronavirus mutation detected in Britain “the English variant”.
“Just as we didn’t talk about the ‘Chinese virus’ last year, now we shouldn’t be talking about the ‘English variant’,” said Spahn, Reuters reported.