[ad_1]
Liguria. “No panic.” So Matteo bassetti, director of the infectious diseases clinic of the San Martino hospital in Genoa, comments on the news of the new variant of Sars-CoV-2, the coronavirus responsible for Covid-19, discovered in England. For this reason, Italy has also decided to suspend all flights from the UK.
“It is a mutated virus that has been temporarily named VUI-202012/01 – explains Bassetti -. It seems more contagious or that it is transmitted more easily from one individual to another, but not more aggressive or lethal. Obviously, these are hypotheses that will be confirmed by studies still in progress. This variant is circulating heavily and frequently in the south-east of the UK”.
But what exactly happened to the virus? “There have been 17 mutations, the most significant of which is N501Y in the spike protein that the virus uses to bind to human cells. This mutation, as already mentioned, would make it spread more easily ”, explains the Genoese doctor.
For Bassetti there is nothing to worry about: “It is not the first mutation described in the world and it will not be the last. Similar mutations had already been described in Spain and other countries. “Viruses are constantly changing. It is their way of life: change to survive. It cannot be excluded that this variant is not already circulating in other countries, including Italy. We will have to continue studying the viral genome of the virus strains isolated in our country ”.
And will the vaccine be effective? Those that work on mRna, that is, Pfizer and Moderna, will work because “they make our body produce antibodies against many parts of the spike protein and the mutation described affects only a small part. So don’t panic. We monitor, study and continue with the vaccination plan.
[ad_2]
