South Africa Says Its Coronavirus Variant No More Dangerous Than UK Strain
RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – South African Health Minister Zwelini Mkhize replied to his British counterpart Matt Hancock and said on Friday that there is currently no evidence that the 501.V2 variant found in South Africa is more contagious than the UK strain, as suggested by the European country’s Health Secretary.
“There is also no evidence that it causes a more severe form of the disease or increases mortality, compared to the UK variant or any of the mutations identified worldwide,” Mkhize added in a statement.
On Wednesday, Hancock had said that South Africa’s new coronavirus variant was “of great concern, because it is more contagious and appears to have mutated more than the one identified in the UK.” He then announced travel restrictions between the two countries.
These statements “may have created a perception that the variant in South Africa has been a major factor in the second wave in the UK, which is not the case,” Mkhize said in his Christmas message. Research findings show that the UK mutation developed before the South African one, he added.
On the other hand, the South African Minister lamented the decision to ban travel between the United Kingdom and his country. “There is no evidence that the South African strain is more pathogenic than the British strain,” and this is what prompted the measure, he insisted.
The strain called 501.V2 is present in the most recent infections in South Africa, pointed out the local health authorities and scientific experts this week, and it is the dominant type of virus in the new wave of infections affecting the country. But specific figures on how contagious this South African variant may be are not yet available.
South Africa, the most affected country in Africa with 26,000 deaths, documented over 14,000 cases over the past two days, compared to an average of 8,000-10,000 earlier this week.
Confirmation of the transmissibility level of the strain detected in the United Kingdom, which would be between 40 and 70% higher than the original strain, prompted British authorities to decree a new lockdown in London and part of England, affecting a total of 16 million people. In turn, dozens of countries suspended travel to the country and there is chaos on land trade.
While there is no evidence that the mutations are more lethal, their infectivity increases the risk of compromising hospital systems. Moreover, PCR or rapid tests may be less effective in detecting the disease, thereby undermining one of the main strategies for fighting the epidemic.
“Coronaviruses mutate all the time, so it is not surprising that new SARS-CoV-2 variants are emerging,” recalled Professor Julian Hiscox, from the University of Liverpool. “The main thing is to try to find out if this variant has properties that impact human health, diagnostics, and vaccines”.
For his part, French geneticist Axel Kahn recalled that, to date, 300,000 SARS-CoV-2 mutations have been sequenced in the world. “The more viruses there are, and therefore the more people infected, the more random mutations there will be” that are ‘advantageous’ for the virus,” he added.
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