A new variation of the coronavirus, AY.4.2, has begun to spread in the UK. It is reported by Financial Times citing a scientist at the Wellcome Sanger Institute in Cambridge, Geoffrey Barrett, and François Ballou, director of the Institute of Genetics, University of London.
As noted, the new type of infection is a variation of the “delta” strain of coronavirus, however, apparently, it is more infectious than the original version – at least 10-15 percent. At the same time, according to Ballou, AY.4.2 may turn out to be the most infectious version of the coronavirus identified since the beginning of the pandemic.
At the same time, the specialist emphasized that while the new variation is recorded only in the UK – now it accounts for about 10 percent of all cases of infection in the country. Ballou also noted that the spread of the new form could be just a “random demographic event.”
In turn, Barrett said that, despite the higher infectivity of AY.4.2, the observed increase in the incidence in the UK is primarily due to the fact that residents are neglecting preventive measures, and not with the emergence of a new variation of the virus.
Another expert interviewed by the publication, professor of clinical microbiology at the University of Cambridge, Ravi Gupta, stressed that AY.4.2 is unlikely to contribute to the spread of coronavirus as significantly as the “British” and “Indian” strains did earlier.
Earlier in October, it was reported that emergency hospitals in the UK were overcrowded and close to collapse. So, there are cases when some patients had to wait almost 50 hours in line to go to the hospital.
According to the latest data, 8,449,165 cases of coronavirus infection were recorded in the UK. The number of recovered patients is 6,916,439, while 138,584 carriers of the infection have died. Over the past day, 45 140 new cases of the disease have been identified in the country.
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