[ad_1]
According to Bloomberg, a study is already underway that has already identified at least one mutation that affects a particular amino acid, meaning the virus can multiply faster and become more contagious, according to the Journal of the American Medical Association, ” said A. Fauci.
The news of changes that could accelerate the spread of the virus worldwide came at a time when the number of new cases is growing. Since the virus was identified half a year ago, 517,000 people have died worldwide. people, more than 10.7 million. to get sick. Most American states have begun to consider opening up their economies, and Latin America and the rest of the world continue to watch the growth of cases.
Coronavirus, the most common strain in the world today, is more likely to infect human cells than the original genetic line, which was first found in China, according to a new study published Thursday.
A laboratory study published in the journal Cell suggests that the mutated virus that is currently spreading is more contagious to humans under real conditions than the previous strain, but this has not yet been proven.
“I think the data shows that there has been a mutation that really allows the virus to replicate better and possibly lead to a higher viral load,” said Fauci, the chief communicable disease specialist in the US, in a comment to the Journal of the American Medical Association. investigation.
“We don’t know if [šios atmainos virusu] the infected person feels worse or not. It still appears that the virus is replicating better and may be more contagious, but there are still attempts to confirm it, “he added.
Researchers from the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico and Duke University in North Carolina collaborated with the COVID-19 genomics team at the University of Sheffield in the United Kingdom to analyze virus genome samples published on the international platform of GISAID gene sequencing results.
They discovered that the current strain, called D614G, has a small but significant structure in the protein that makes up the so-called ‘spikes’ of the virus. These growths on the surface of the coronavirus allow it to penetrate and infect human cells.
The article was first published by researchers in April on the bioRxiv pre-publication platform for medical studies, where it gained record popularity.
However, the findings of this study were initially criticized because the researchers did not demonstrate that it was the mutation that occurred that led to the current dominance of D614G, as this could be due to other factors or coincidences.
Therefore, this group conducted additional research, but in response to the recommendations of the Cell editors.
The researchers analyzed data from 999 patients hospitalized in the UK for coronavirus infection. They found that samples of the new strain from people infected with viruses had higher concentrations of virus particles, but they did not find that these people had a more severe form of the disease.
At that time, laboratory experiments showed that the new virus strain was 3-6 times more capable of infecting human cells.
“The virus appears to be more energetic,” said Erica Ollmann Saphire, who conducted one of the experiments at the Choja Institute for Immunology in California.
However, so far not all assumptions about the new strain have been tested, as laboratory experiments often do not correspond to outbreak dynamics.
Although the virus that is currently spreading may be more “contagious”, its transmission between people is not necessarily faster.
According to Nathan Grubaugh, a virologist at the Yale School of Public Health who was not involved in the study, however, the introduction of the new strain of the virus “by natural selection or by chance means that the variant is now a pandemic.”
In his comment on the new study, N. Grubaugh added that for the public, these results do little to change.
“While significant research remains to be done to determine whether this will have a significant impact on drug or vaccine development, we do not expect D614G to affect our controls or aggravate individual cases of infection,” he wrote. “It’s more of a direct look at the evolution of science: An interesting discovery has been made, potentially involving millions of people, but we don’t yet know the full scope or impact.”
It is strictly prohibited to use the information published by DELFI on other websites, in the media or elsewhere, or to distribute our material in any way without consent, and if consent has been obtained, DELFI must be indicated as the source.
[ad_2]
