The new variants of coronavirus in circulation currently
- July 2, 2022
- Posted by: OptimizeIAS Team
- Category: DPN Topics
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The new variants of coronavirus in circulation currently
Subject: Science
Section: Biotechnology
Context:
- The country’s current surge in Covid-19 cases is because of the BA.2 sub-variant of Omicron — which drove the third wave in January, along with BA.1 — and another sub-variant that has branched off from it, called BA.2.38.
The new variants and current surge in cases:
- The biggest difference between the current surge and the one in January is that there is no cluster formation with any of the emerging sub-variants.
- Delhi reported its first couple of cases of the BA.5 sub-variant of Omicron — this was one of the sub-variants that led to an increase in cases in South Africa a couple of months ago.
- The first BA.5 case in India was reported in late May in Telangana. experts believe that there is no clinical significance of this change.
Which Covid-19 variants are currently the most in circulation?
- Genome sequences uploaded to the global database GISAID show that
- BA.2.38 — which branched off from BA.2 — is dominant in the country, accounting for 30% of all sequences over the last 30 days.
- This was followed by the BA.2 sub-variant itself, accounting for 28% of samples.
- Although BA.4 and BA.5 were detected in the country at almost the same time ,BA.5 has been spreading faster, accounting for 7% of the sequences uploaded to the global database in the last 30 days.
What has changed between the January wave and the current wave?
- The biggest difference is that there is no cluster formation with any of the emerging sub-variants.
- When Omicron was on the rise in December-end and January, there was clear cluster formation, which helped researchers quickly connect the dots that the increase was driven by the new variant.
What does coronavirus cluster mean?
- Cluster: It refers to an aggregation of cases of a disease. A coronavirus cluster occurs when there is a concentration of infections in the same area at the same time.
- In general, the World Health Organization (WHO) uses the following categories (PDF) to describe transmission patterns: sporadic cases, clusters of cases and community transmission.