According to health monitoring data, the most recent COVID-19 strain, BA.2.86, appears to be spreading in the UK.
Scientists are concerned about the variety known as Pirola because of the large number of mutations it carries, raising the chance that it may be more transmissible or able to evade the immune system, as reported by The Guardian.
Still Too Early to Determine the Scope of the Outbreak
The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) said in a briefing note on Friday that an outbreak at a care facility in Norfolk and other instances throughout the UK suggested there was probably community transmission of the strain, but that it was still too early to determine the entire scope of its dissemination.
The UKHSA reported that at the end of August, there was an outbreak of COVID-19 in a care facility in Norfolk, where 33 out of 38 residents and 12 staff members tested positive for the virus.
One resident required hospital care, but there were no recorded fatalities. Following laboratory testing, it was discovered that six staff members and 22 residents shared the BA.2.86 variation.
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An Early Indicator That It May Be Transmissible
Although it was still too early to make any predictions about how BA.2.86 might behave in the larger UK population, the UKHSA said the outbreak was "an early indicator" that the variant may be sufficiently transmissible to have an impact in close-contact settings.
The UKHSA said that all staff members and 29 of the 33 residents at the care facility who tested positive for COVID-19 have made a full recovery.
Although BA.2.86 exhibited a "significant number of mutations" compared to other variations circulating, the UKHSA incident director Dr. Renu Bindra stated that the data was "too limited to draw firm conclusions" regarding the effect this might have on the transmissibility or severity of the virus.
Initial worries about the possibility of BA.2.86 causing a new worldwide wave of infection, similar to what happened with the advent of Omicron, have been allayed by some preliminary lab-based findings.
According to a preliminary investigation from Chinese researchers, BA.2.86 is less effective at infecting lab-grown cells than other circulating Omicron subvariants.
Researchers in Sweden showed that serum from blood donors could neutralize BA.2.86 just slightly less effectively than other versions, according to another pre-print study.
As a safety measure against BA.2.86, the most recent COVID-19 vaccination booster program has been moved from October to September.
On September 11, the booster program will start in England. Adult care home residents and clinically vulnerable individuals will initially receive vaccinations before everyone in the UK who is 65 years of age and older.
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