New Scientist, a credible science and technology magazine, cites Nextstrain, a pathogen-tracking project, that the UK coronavirus variant or B.1.1.7 is responsible for the COVID-19 surge in Asia, which % of cases. The South African variant or B.1.351 line of coronavirus is next in line, responsible for 16% of cases.
Still, India, which now records most individual cases daily, claims there is no evidence to suggest that, even though it has an indigenous coronavirus mutant that is now a cause for concern.
On March 24, the Union government confirmed that the coronavirus double mutant, or B.1.617 lineage, was largely present in Maharashtra and in small numbers in six other states. But according to the latest Ministry of Health observation, the mutant infection has spread to three more states. Thus, the mutant is present in many states badly affected by the second wave, including Maharashtra, Delhi, West Bengal, Gujarat, Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh, and each state is witnessing an upward trend.
The ‘New Scientist’ report questions the operation of the Indian initiative ‘the Indian SARS-CoV-2 Consortium on Genomics (INSACOG)’, founded in December 2020 to discover several genomic sequences that could be more contagious and deadly than the original coronavirus strain. year. It also raises possibilities, for example, if the new mutant strains are behind a rapid rise in the COVID wave in several states.
Take Maharashtra for example.
Between January and March this year, Maharashtra saw a 15-20% increase in the number of double mutants of the coronavirus. On April 10, the National Institute of Virology shared a report of a limited genome sequencing analysis of positive samples, which found that the double mutant coronavirus was responsible for 61% of cases in Maharashtra. As many as 220 of the 361 samples became positive for double mutant coronavirus. Mumbai has not yet reported this species, but it could be the next big factor in the second wave of coronavirus if we analyze the samples on a larger scale.
The B.1.617 lineage evolved when two mutated strains, E484Q and L452R, came together to form a third strain. The E484Q strain is from India and L452R is a California strain. It is an indigenous species now found in many other countries including the US and UK. The fact that the Indian species is now found in many other countries only indicates that the double mutant is spreading.
What may be the glaring mistake here is the fact that India has not yet widely tested coronavirus samples, even though the mutant viruses are now lagging behind the rapid scale of rise in many countries.
In 128 days, India has only been able to genome sequence about 14,000 test samples for coronavirus variants, even if the British variant is now the main COVID strain behind 40% cases in Asia. According to the Newstrain analysis whether in many countries including the UK where it causes 98% of new cases or in the US with 25-30% new cases due to the British variant or the South African variant which is resistant to many vaccines or the Brazilian variant that can re-infect humans.
India tests an average of only 109 positive samples per day to analyze the coronavirus genome sequences to discover other deadly mutants of the virus, while the fact is that the genome sequence is the best way to find out which variant of the virus is circulating the most . .
The Global Initiative on Sharing All Influenza Data (GISAID) is a platform for sharing data for genome sequences of influenza and COVID-19 viruses, and India and many other countries provide genome sequencing data to this freely accessible website. According to the GISAID database, the UK has supplied 3.67 lakh genomes so far, followed by the US with 2.83 lakh genomes, Germany with more than 54,000 genomes and Denmark with more than 50,000 genomes, but India, it up second hardest hit country, here is a laggard. So far, the country has provided only 7,842 genome sequences.
Yes, we cannot say whether the coronavirus mutants are largely behind the recent wave, but at the same time, we also cannot deny that B.1.617 has emerged as the main cause behind the COVID surge in Maharashtra in the studies conducted so far.
What’s important here is the fact that we have not yet tested its genomic sequencing on a large scale to know its spread, even if we identified this coronavirus variant on December 7 last year. The mutant is about four months old at the date of detection. Likewise, the British variant has been found in 80% of the test samples from Punjab taken for genome sequencing and has spread to about 19 states in the country.
It can be argued that a very small number of positive test samples have undergone genome sequencing and the results cannot be presented for a larger population base, but the only way out is to run more tests. Because failing to do so could be a fatal mistake if we later discover that the mutant virus is vaccine resistant, as has happened with the South African variety that is resistant to Covishield, India’s leading COVID vaccine.
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