South Africa identifies new virus variant displaying a ‘big jump in evolution’

Scientists in South Africa identified on Thursday a concerning new variant of the coronavirus, whose mutations mark a “big jump in evolution” that is driving a spike in new cases. Hours later, Britain banned flights from six southern African nations citing the variant.

In the past two days, scientists detected the B1.1.529 variant after observing an increase in infections in South Africa’s economic hub surrounding Johannesburg. So far, 22 positive cases have been identified in the country, according to South Africa’s National Institute for Communicable Diseases. One case has been detected in Hong Kong from someone who had travelled from South Africa. No cases have been detected yet in Britain.

Since the onset of the pandemic, a number of variants have emerged. One underlying concern about new variants is whether they will stymie progress against the pandemic or whether they will limit the effectiveness of vaccines. South African scientists will meet with the World Health Organisation technical team Friday, where authorities will assign a letter of the Greek alphabet to this variant.

By Thursday evening, Britain had banned flights from South Africa, Botswana, Eswatini, Lesotho, Namibia and Zimbabwe starting at noon local time Friday. The six nations will be added to the country’s red list, which would require British travellers coming from those nations to quarantine on arrival.

In Dec 2020, South Africa was the first nation to report the appearance of the beta variant, which has now spread to nearly 70 countries. Scientists have been concerned that some clinical trials have shown that vaccines offer less protection against the beta variant. Since then, the more virulent and aggressive delta variant has spread all over the world.

The variant has also been identified in Botswana. The country’s health ministry confirmed in a statement that four cases of the new variant were detected in people who were fully vaccinated.

With over 1,200 new infections, South Africa’s daily infection rate is much lower than in Germany, where new cases are driving a wave. However, the density of mutations on this new variant raises fears that it could be highly contagious, leading scientists to sound the alarm early.

“This variant did surprise us, it has a big jump in evolution, many more mutations than we expected, especially after a very severe third wave of delta,” said Tulio de Oliveira, director of the KwaZulu-Natal Research and Innovation Sequencing Platform.

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