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A case of a new virus first detected in India was identified in the San Francisco Bay Area last week and seven more cases are expected.
Stanford Health Care’s clinical virology lab has detected the variant and believes it is the first identified case in the United States, according to KRON.
The variant found in India exhibits a combination of two mutations in the bristle protein that have been identified in other variants: the L452R mutation first detected in California, which is believed to be 20% more transmissible, and the dominant E484Q in Brazil.
The virus has mutated throughout the pandemic. Most of the mutations are insignificant, but scientists have looked at which ones could make the virus easier or make people sicker. The variants first detected in South Africa, Britain, Brazil and California have been designated “variants of concern” by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. All of these variants have been detected in the Bay Area.
Early research suggests that vaccines offer protection against the newer variants, although they may be slightly less effective and more investigation is needed.
The Indian variant was mainly detected in the state of Maharashtra and the Department of Health said in a statement that it was found in 15% to 20% of samples sequenced in that region.
There has been no definitive evidence that it is more transmissible, Dr Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious disease expert at UCSF, told KCBS on Monday morning.
“My instinct is that the vaccines will work against this Indian variant,” Chin-Hong said. “Last week we got data that Pfizer works against the South African variant. This being a bit similar, I hope it works too.”
Stanford researchers have screened hundreds of viral samples taken from people across the Bay Area and are sequencing entire viral genomes to identify new mutations as they arise in key viral proteins.
“In most cases, it is too early to say if or how these variants will influence the course of the pandemic, but it is important to monitor their progress and spread”, Dr Benjamin Pinsky, associate professor of pathology and infectious diseases at the School of Medicine, said in a statement. “Our surveillance assays are specially designed to allow large-scale screening of viral samples to identify specific strains circulating in the Bay Area and throughout California.”
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
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