Tulio de Oliveira, who runs the Genetic Sequencing Institutions in South Africa, has announced the emergence of two new sub-strains of the highly pathogenic “Omicron” mutant of the Coronavirus, in the country.
He said in tweets on “Twitter”, that the two sub-strains were called “BA.4” and “BA.5” (BA.5), adding that the two new strains did not cause an increase in the number of infections in the country, and that he They were found in samples from a number of countries.
The complex Immunity landscape in South Africa, with high population immunity, is probably one of the main causes of the low infections, hospitalization, and deaths since the Delta and Omicron BA.1 wave. pic.twitter.com/aXR40oAwNi
— Tulio de Oliveira (@Tuliodna) April 11, 2022
This comes a day after the World Health Organization announced that it is tracking a few dozen infections with two new sub-strains of the “Omicron” mutant, in order to assess whether they are more contagious or more dangerous.
The WHO added the PA4 and PA5 sub-strains of the original Omicron PA1 to its watch list. It is already following the effect of the two strains “PA1” and “PA2”, which are now spread worldwide, as well as “PA1.1” and “PA3”.
Viruses all the time undergo a continuous and continuous process of mutation, but only some mutations affect their ability to spread or overcome immunity acquired from vaccination, previous infection, or the severity of the disease they cause.
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