A woman walks past a closed souvenir window and messages from the government on a telephone booth on Oxford Street in London.
Photographer: Chris J. Ratcliffe / Bloomberg
Photographer: Chris J. Ratcliffe / Bloomberg
The UK coronavirus strain that has caused concern around the world has picked up another mutation that appears to make the virus more resistant to vaccines.
Scientists have identified the mutation at 11 different sequences of the new species, Public Health England said in an updated version report Monday. The findings came from a data set of more than 200,000 sequences.
Present in the variants that originated in South Africa and Brazil, the mutation is believed to help the virus resist vaccines and antibody therapies – and infect people who have already fought Covid.
The change is “a worrying development,” said Julian Tang, a professor and clinical virologist at the University of Leicester. comments on the Science Media Center in the UK. The “reassurances of recent studies showing that the mRNA vaccines still provide optimal protection against the original British variant may no longer apply.”
It’s unclear whether the mutation occurred alone or after a process of recombination with one of the South African or Brazilian variants, a process common in influenza viruses but not in coronaviruses, Tang said.
The fact that the mutation originated on British soil suggests that travel restrictions to limit the movement of people from South Africa may not be enough, said Sam Fazeli, an analyst with Bloomberg Intelligence. Instead, there is a growing need for vaccine manufacturers to design updates to their shots that target the new strains.
Last week, Johnson & Johnson and Novavax Inc. both known results from late-stage clinical trials showing that their respective vaccines were slightly less effective in South Africa.
The emergence of new strains of coronavirus has meant that people must be vaccinated more quickly before mutations become widespread. Drug makers say they are working on booster shots that could increase the potency of their vaccines against the new mutations.
The disclosure of the new mutation comes as the virus is generally retreating in the UK, which reported the lowest number of new daily cases since December on Monday.
(Updates with analyst comments in sixth paragraph)