The South African Medical Association confirmed that the “C. 1.1″ mutant, which is currently circulating in the country, is mutated from the strain that first appeared in the Chinese city of Wuhan, pointing out that scientists have noticed that the mutant is developing slowly.
Johannesburg – Sputnik. The President of the South African Medical Association, Angelique Coetzee, said in a statement to “Sputnik”, that “scientists are conducting tests on the strain [c. 1.2] that is currently circulating in the country, and it appeared that it is spreading slowly, and is mutated from the strain that first appeared in Wuhan”.
“Right now, South Africa and the world have nothing to worry about,” Coetzee added.
“Scientists have seen that it is better to educate the public, but at the moment it cannot be compared to [delta] or [beta] variants, but it may represent a threat in the future,” she explained.
She pointed out that, “Now that the new Corona infections are gradually declining, it is likely that it will be a problem during the fourth wave, which will not come any time soon.”
Earlier, South African scientists said that they had identified a new type of coronavirus, “SARS Cove 2,” stressing that it contains a number of worrying mutations.
The C1.2 variant was first identified in May in South Africa’s Mpumalanga and Gauteng provinces, where Johannesburg and the capital Pretoria are located, the scientists said in a research paper.
Changes in the virus have led to successive waves of the epidemic, and the ‘delta’ variant, first discovered in India, is now causing high infection rates worldwide.
Mutations are first classified as variants of interest by the World Health Organization, and once identified as more severe or transmissible, they are described as variants of concern.
C1.2 is an evolution from C1, the variant that dominated infection in the first wave of the virus in South Africa in mid-2020.
The research has been published by South African groups including Crisp and the National Institute of Infectious Diseases.
The total number of COVID-19 cases in South Africa has reached 2,777,659, with 8,2261 deaths and 2,544,563 recoveries.