As of April 20, India’s homegrown variant of the novel coronavirus has spread to at least 15 other countries, worrying health administrators and scientists across the world. Several countries, most recently the United Kingdom, have banned flights from India and there is a growing clamour in many other countries like Canada to do the same.
Although there is lack of data, there is widespread speculation among Indian scientists that the country’s current surge – the worst since the outbreak of the pandemic – is fuelled by this variant, labelled B.1.617.
According to the global GISAID database, a free-to-access collaborative initiative of the German government and Friends of the non-profit GISAID, the variant accounted for 63.6% of coronavirus strains from India which underwent genome sequencing by GISAID participants in the last four weeks.
Apart from India, the variant is most prevalent in the United Kingdom, United States, Singapore and Australia.
“It is remarkable how far it has spread since it was first detected,” said Jeremy P Kamil, associate professor of microbiology and immunology at Louisiana State University in the United States.
Growing concernsThe B.1.617 variant was first detected in Maharashtra in October, show GISAID records. It was initially thought to comprise two mutations – E484Q and L452R – and hence, referred to as a...
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