[New Tang Dynasty Beijing time July 03, 2021]Following the Delta variant of the Chinese Communist virus (COVID-19), the Lambda variant has also attracted worldwide attention. Lambda has an “unusual” combination of mutations, which puzzles scientists, and Latin American officials are already worried.
The Lambda variant formerly known as C.37 was first discovered in Peru in December 2020 and has since spread to 27 countries including the United Kingdom. The World Health Organization (WHO) designated it as a “variant to be seen” last month.
The WHO warned that the Lambda variant may be more infectious than the Delta variant. Pablo Tsukayama, PhD in molecular microbiology at Cayetano Heredia University in Peru, mentioned that when medical staff first discovered this variant in December last year, “every 200 It only occupies 1 of the samples”.
“However, by March of this year, it accounted for about 50% of the Lima sample, and now it accounts for about 80%, which may indicate that its spread is greater than other variants,” said Dr. Tsuyama.
According to WHO data, in Peru recently, 82% of CCP virus cases were caused by the Lambda variant, and Peru has the highest CCP virus death rate in the world. In neighboring Chile, the Lambda variant causes nearly one-third of cases. But many experts disagree with the statement that Lambda is more offensive than other variants, and they say that more research is needed to reach a conclusion.
Monica Acevedo of the University of Santiago in Chile and her colleagues collected blood samples from local medical staff who received two doses of China’s CoronaVac vaccine to study the effects of Lambda on the infectivity of the virus.
On Thursday (1st), Acevedo et al. concluded in a preprinted paper waiting to be peer-reviewed that the Lambda variant is more contagious than Gamma and Alpha, and can evade the antibodies generated by vaccination, “Our Information shows for the first time that the latest mutation in the spike protein of the Lambda variant can evade neutralizing antibodies and increase infectivity.”
The UK reported 6 cases of Lambda variant last week. The country’s health authorities classified it as a “variant under investigation,” but there is no information on its spread and symptoms.
Jeff Barrett, director of the COVID-19 genomics project at the Wellcome Sanger Institute in the United Kingdom, said that testing the virulence of Lambda variants has become difficult. One reason is that Lambda is compared with other variants. There is a set of “unusual” mutations.
Barrett added that due to the lack of gene sequencing services in Latin America, it is difficult to know exactly to what extent Lambda has contributed to the development of the epidemic in the region.
Latin America is the most severely affected region in the world. The population of this region only accounts for 8% of the global population, but the Chinese Communist Party virus cases account for 20%. In recent weeks, the number of new cases in Colombia, Paraguay and Uruguay has surged.
(Reporter Li Zhaoxi Comprehensive Report/Editor in Charge: Yun Tao)
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