Scientists have identified a new strain of the coronavirus that has become dominant worldwide and appears to be more contagious than the versions that spread in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a new study led by scientists at Los Alamos National Laboratory. The new strain appeared in February in Europe, migrated quickly to the East Coast of the United States and has been the dominant strain across the world since mid-March, the scientists wrote. In addition to spreading faster, it may make people vulnerable to a second infection after a first bout with the disease, the report warned.
The 33-page report was posted Thursday on BioRxiv, a website that researchers use to share their work before it is peer reviewed, an effort to speed up collaborations with scientists working on COVID-19 vaccines or treatments. That research has been largely based on the genetic sequence of earlier strains and might not be effective against the new one. The mutation identified in the new report affects the now infamous spikes on the exterior of the coronavirus, which allow it to enter human respiratory cells. The report’s authors said they felt an “urgent need for an early warning” so that vaccines and drugs under development around the world will be effective against the mutated strain.
Wherever the new strain appeared, it quickly infected far more people than the earlier strains that came out of Wuhan, China, and within weeks it was the only strain that was prevalent in some nations, according to the report. The new strain’s dominance over its predecessors demonstrates that it is more infectious, according to the report, though exactly why is not yet known. The coronavirus, known to scientists as SARS-CoV-2, has infected more than 3.5 million people around the world and caused more than 250,000 COVID-19 deaths since its discovery late last year. The report was based on a computational analysis of more than 6,000 coronavirus sequences from around the world, collected by the Global Initiative for Sharing All Influenza Data, a public-private organization in Germany. Time and again, the analysis found the new version was transitioning to become dominant. –Yahoo
A pandemic of the novel coronavirus has now killed more than a quarter of a million people worldwide. Over 3.6 million people across the globe have been diagnosed with COVID-19, the disease caused by the new respiratory virus, according to data compiled by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University. The actual numbers are believed to be much higher due to testing shortages, many unreported cases and suspicions that some governments are hiding the scope of their nations’ outbreaks. A coronavirus model now forecasts that nearly 135,000 people will die of COVID-19 in the United States by early August — almost double its previous projection.
Fifteen children, many of whom tested positive for or had previously been exposed to the novel coronavirus, have recently been admitted to New York City hospitals with a mysterious illness possibly linked to COVID-19, health officials said in an alert Monday night. The patients, aged 2 to 15, had been hospitalized in intensive care from April 17 to May 1 with various symptoms associated with toxic shock or Kawasaki disease, a rare inflammatory syndrome typically affecting children under the age of 5. None of the reported patients have died, though more than half required blood pressure support and five needed mechanical ventilation, according to the bulletin posted by the New York City Health Department.
“Clinical features vary, depending on the affected organ system, but have been noted to include features of Kawasaki disease or features of shock,” Dr. Demetre Daskalakis, deputy city health commissioner for disease control, said in the alert Monday night. “However, the full spectrum of disease is not yet known.” All 15 patients had subjective or measured fever while more than half reported rash, abdominal pain, vomiting or diarrhea. Less than half of those patients reported respiratory symptoms, according to the city health department, which described the mystery ailment as a “multi-system inflammatory syndrome potentially associated with COVID-19.” Molecular diagnostic testing showed four of the patients were positive for the virus strain that causes COVID-19, while antibody testing revealed that six who had tested negative were likely previously infected with the virus. –ABC News
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