Scientists from the University of Southern Illinois have identified a third U.S. variant of the virus that causes COVID-19 – and it is perhaps the most contagious species yet, researchers said Thursday.
The homemade mutation, called 20C-US, is believed to account for up to 50 percent of all U.S. affairs – hitting the Middle East the hardest, researchers said in a press release.
“It’s here. We found it,” said Keith Gagnon, associate professor of biochemistry at SIU Carbondale. “It was definitely homemade and widespread.”
Gagnon said he and his team brought the tension back to Texas, where it first appeared in May.
The mutation has a great ability to process viral proteins along with a strong “RNA genome integrity”, the researchers said, and it makes it frighteningly efficient to spread.
“It can be more easily transmitted than other variants, and its impact on vaccines is uncertain,” the press release read.
The findings come a day after Ohio State University scientists said they had discovered another strain of the COVID-19 virus – which carries a mutation similar to the British strain.
The results of the 20C US study were published in the online journal bioRxiv.org on Wednesday.
“We predict that 20C-US may be the most dominant variant of SARS-CoV-2 in the US,” the article reads.
“The ongoing evolution of the 20C US, as well as other dominant region-specific variants emerging around the world, needs to be constantly monitored.”
Fortunately, according to the report, the virus variant probably did not spread significantly beyond the US borders.