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Teacher Maria Rosaria Capobianchi directs the virology laboratory of the Lazzaro Institute Spallanzani from Rome, where Sars-CoV-2 was first isolated in Italy, at the beginning of the pandemic. He warns: we must be vigilant, but we should not be surprised if there is any mutation. And it is not unlikely that the new variant is already in Italy, although we cannot prove it yet.
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Should we fear the virus mutation announced by the UK government?
«Let’s start with a fact: the first Italian variant, that of Codogno, in February, was already from clade G, it already carried a mutation. In short: it has already been modified compared to the Wuhan virus. Other mutations followed, clade G became clade GR, and later others overlapped, starting with the one that began in Spain, clade GV. East of the United Kingdom is yet another. Clade is a word almost synonymous with the noun strain. The molecular part is uniform. ‘
What happened?
“It should not surprise us, it is normal for mutations to occur in an RNA virus. In fact, it is changing even less than we might have expected from such a widespread virus. The hepatitis C virus and HIV, to take two examples, have much greater variability. ‘
The British minister says it is more contagious.
“The fact that this variant has spread so quickly in the UK raises the question: why did it take over? The immediate answer is: maybe it’s more infectious, maybe it’s more contagious. But it is only a hypothesis. The same happened in Europe with the rest of the variants: a few months ago, starting in Spain, the GV variant was introduced, which replaced the previous ones in some countries or is becoming predominant in others, such as Italy.
Has the UK variant arrived in Italy yet?
“We do not know it yet. But it is likely, given that there are constant communications between the two countries. Look, there are no Italian or German stocks in Europe. At first it came from China, from there it radiated, but at this point we can already speak of a European stock, it makes no sense to speak of an Italian, German, Spanish stock ».
However, to date, has not each variation been accompanied by increased lethality?
“Never. To date, a given Sars-CoV-2 mutation has never been shown to cause a more serious infection.”
If the virus mutates, can the immunization of those who have been in contact with Sars-CoV-2 in the past be questioned?
“At the moment the answer is no. It’s okay to keep the focus high, to come up with some ideas, but for now there is no evidence that the mutation could compromise immunization. We must be vigilant to see if a mutation so different that it escapes immunological recognition emerges.
From this arises a decisive question that we all ask ourselves: is there a risk that vaccines will not be effective if the virus mutates?
“There is no evidence and at the moment there is no concrete risk that the variability of the virus predisposes the vaccine to escape, that is, makes it ineffective. Of course, we must be vigilant: for example, for the flu virus this happens and every year the vaccine adapts to the mutation. It is not so complicated, but for influenza there is an international organization that collects all strains and intervenes in the vaccine.
Could we resent ourselves in five years and think that it will be normal every year to repeat the vaccination against Sars-CoV-2, adapting the vaccine, exactly as we already do for the flu?
“Yes, it is possible. But we still don’t know how much this virus will change. There are three hypotheses. First scenario: the virus is eradicated, it will disappear. Second scenario: it will continue to cause serious infections. Third scenario: this is the much more likely, the virus after If it has put us in difficulties, it will become endemic, like many coronaviruses that continue to circulate, but without major problems because there are some immune people in the population. In this third scenario, it is possible, as we do with the flu, that the vaccination is repeated every year. Fortunately, never before in this tragedy has it been demonstrated how much technology has been developed and already today we find a plethora of potential vaccines thanks to many different approaches that will give us more weapons. In short: the more powerful weapons we have, the more we will be able to control the mutations. For this, it is correct that the largest possible number of vaccines be developed. s bullets we have, with the first authorized vaccine, but if others are added, the better.
Will you be among the first to get vaccinated?
“I wish it were, I have a lot of faith in vaccines, they are a powerful weapon, we are lucky to have them. And the new RNA vaccines are an extraordinary weapon. This pandemic tragedy has caused a lot of pain, but it has also resulted in an unprecedented acceleration of research that will also be useful for other diseases. Science has taken a very important step forward “
Last updated: 19:32
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