Alarm in Peru: they study a new variant of the coronavirus and warn that it could already circulate in Argentina

In the midst of a second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic hitting South America, Peruvian scientists have sounded a new alarm signal that threatens the region even more. As they have warned, they are studying a new variant of the virus apparently originating in Peru or Chile. They even claimed that it is likely to be already “exported” to other countries in the region, such as Argentina.

There is evidence “that it is found in Chile, Argentina, Colombia, Ecuador, the United States and several other countries in the region,” said the doctor of molecular microbiology. Pablo Tsukayama quoted by the radio portal RPP news.

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And he added: “According to our analysis, in the samples presented between January and March, this new variant, which since last week has been given the name C.37, would correspond to almost 40% of the samples that we have processed in Lima. . “

The scientist said that the information is still “preliminary” and commented that the strain was detected as part of the genomic surveillance project which is applied in his country and which allows to process each month “a sample of a hundred of genomes from Lima and Peru “.

“What we see is that in December, more or less, a new variant starts to appear that we had never seen before, which is not British, Brazilian or South African, but drifting something circulating around here, ”he said.

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Where do you come from

Tsukayama said the new strain “is growing in Lima” and “also throughout Peru” and stressed that “all of this data is preliminary, but we have a variant that native to Peru or Chile, but it would already be exported to other parts of the world.

The specialist insisted that “the evidence is very preliminary” and clarified that for this reason, it cannot currently be confirmed that this new variant has “greater transmissibility, neither greater virulence, nor greater mortality.

And he said, “The only thing we know is that it starts to appear at the same time that the second wave starts to rise in Peru. It is a correlation ”.

The specialist also said that “this new line (variant) of SARS-CoV-2 appears to be developing rapidly in Peru and Chile”, although he clarified that “more data is needed to verify these observations”.

However, he pointed out that C.37 descends from a line called B.1.1.1 that has circulated around the world since the start of the pandemic and that in Peru it has been identified in 10.2% of 1030 genomes processed in 2020.

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”With the data available, we cannot be sure whether C.37 originated in Peru or Chile. They both have similar outbreaks in 2021 and share many daily flights. Another possibility is that it was introduced into Chile and Peru from another country in the region that has not yet detected it, ”he explained.

Peru is currently experiencing a second wave of the pandemic with more than 1.7 million cases and some 60,000 deaths since the start of the emergency.