WHO changed the names of the coronavirus variants: what are they called now

Remembering the scientific names of the coronavirus variants, for example B.1.617, B.1.1.7 or B.1.351, is very difficult, but the World Health Organization (WHO) will make it simple by giving them the names as well. of greek letters.

The idea is to have names “easy to pronounce and remember”, but also to avoid that the general public and the press use names which “stigmatize and discriminate”The World Health Organization (WHO) said in a statement.

In the United States, for example, attacks against people of Asian descent have increased and Donald Trump, who was president during the first year of the pandemic, has done everything to blame China, where the new coronavirus has been detected. for the first time.

Trump sometimes referred to the Chinese virus or the “Kung Flu” (pun on Kung Fu and flu, which means flu).

Scientific names continue to exist because they provide useful data to experts, but WHO will not use them in its daily communication.

The new names

In this way, variant B.1.1.7, previously identified in the UK, will now be called Alpha.

B.1.351, first identified in South Africa, has become Beta and variant P.1, detected in Brazil, Gamma. The latter is the one that is usually known as “de Manaus”, and which has a great circulation in Argentina.

WHO has also given two different names to the subvariants of B.1.617 which devastated India and spread to other countries: B.1.617.2 was called Delta and B.1.617.1 Kappa.

Source: AFP

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