Viruses mutate; so too everything, really. But experts are now concerned about some of the thousands of coronavirus variants that have emerged around the world. We wrote about the British variant last month; now there are more, including one in Los Angeles. You do not have to panic. But it’s good to be informed.
One of the big reasons why we are now seeing new variants, a year into the pandemic, is that there are just so many more viruses than there were 12 months ago. The more virus there is in the world, the more likely it is to mutate. And the more variants there are, the greater the chance that bad news will be for it.
If we (as a world community) had done a better job of containing the virus in the first place, we might not have come to the point that there are several variants that are different enough to worry the experts. But here we are.
Another thing to remember is that you will only find variants if you search for them. The British variant, B.1.1.7, was discovered in part because the United Kingdom does many of the so-called surveillance tests – to monitor exactly what types of coronaviruses there are. The US does this too, but much less. The B.1.1.7 variant was probably already in other countries by the time it was discovered in the United Kingdom; they just haven’t found it yet.
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What are the variants to know?
B.1.1.7 was found in the United Kingdom in November 2020, where it had probably been in circulation since September or earlier. This New York Times article has more details on the strain and its mutations. It appears to be 50% more transmissible than a typical COVID virus. It has multiple mutations, including eight on the ear protein.
(The ear protein is the part of the virus that interacts with our cells. If we make antibodies against the field protein, these antibodies can prevent the virus from infecting us. The mRNA vaccines contain the genetic code of the ear protein, which can our cells make the protein and then make antibodies against it.)
B.1.1.7 is more transmissible, but the disease that causes it does not look worse than usual.
B.1.351 was discovered in South Africa, in samples dating from October 2020, and it also has mutations in the vein protein. It seems to be more transmissible than typical COVID, but it does not change the severity of the disease. Both this variant and the one from the UK share a mutation called N501Y. A recent study, posted as a preview, found that the Pfizer vaccine do It seems to be protected against variants with this mutation.
P.1 is a variant from Brazil, which was first detected in December 2020. It also has mutations that are important, including the peak protein. One of its mutations, E484K, can avoid antibodies; there are some reason to suspect that people who have recovered from a previous case of COVID can be infected by these mutations.
CAL.20C is a variant becoming popular in Los Angeles. We do not know much about it yet.
For all these variants, science is still very new. The things we know about them are tentative. None of them cause more serious diseases; most are likely to be susceptible to existing vaccines; and PCR tests still seem to detect it.
They also often became the dominant strains in their places, but for some of the variants there is a bit of a chicken-and-egg problem to determine if it responsible for nails in cases or not.
What’s happening now?
Two things. First, scientists are working to answer the unanswered questions about these variants.
For example, we need to find out if they are really more transferable, and if so, by how much. We need to know if the variants can evade our natural immunity (meaning you can contract the virus twice) and whether it can evade the immunity against the various vaccines and vaccine candidates that already exist. We need to know if any of the variants cause serious illnesses, or that there are clinical differences. And we need to strengthen our oversight in each country to find new variants as they appear and see where existing variants take over.
Over time, if new variants appear to elude existing vaccinations, the vaccines may need to be updated. We do this every year for the flu vaccine; it is possible that we should do the same thing for the COVID vaccine.
But the other action item is simpler, if it’s still difficult: we need to do the same thing we did to prevent it, only to a greater extent. If a variant is more transferable, it is even more important to wear masks and stay at home and take tests seriously. It’s extra, extra important to get vaccinated in people as soon as possible. So, even if the virus changes, our main measures to control it have not changed.