Coronavirus, what is the new variant identified in Naples

It has been classified as B.1.525. In Italy it had never been identified but on the other hand, considering i few sequencing of the viral genome that we carry out, means little. It had already been detected in 39 cases in the United Kingdom, 35 in Denmark and in a few cases in a dozen countries, from France to Spain via Belgium, Finland, Canada, the United States and Australia. Other cases in Ghana, Jordan and Singapore. To identify it – found in a swab of a professional who returned to Campania from a trip to Africa – were the researchers of thePascale Institute of Naples together with those of the Federico II University, also in the Campania capital.

A variant of which at the moment very little is known: in fact, its characteristics in terms of transmissibility index and lethality are not known. However, we know that it presents a series of mutations. Some have already been observed in the various variants that have worried the planet in recent weeks: from the English one, the B.1.1.7 to the Brazilian ones up to the South African 501.V2. According to the analyzes previously carried out by the Rambaut Group of the Scottish University of Edinburgh, lineage B.1.525 would present deletions similar to the so-called variant found in England and a series of replacements also observed in Brazilian and South African. Among these the most worrying is the E484K, always located on the glicoproteina spike that the virus uses to bind to our cells and penetrate them and which is the main target of antibodies. Located at the receptor binding site of the spike protein, the mutation could allow the virus to evade the immune response and make some of the vaccines already available less effective, in particular that developed by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford.

Apparently, the tampon would be relatively old: it would in fact be a test a couple of months ago, the positive person would observe the period of isolation and would not have any symptoms. But again, in the absence of a rational and financed strategy for sequencing the viral genome, our ability to photograph the changes in the infection and its spread throughout the territory is severely compromised.

B.1.525 is described on the global portal which contains the data of all the variants which reports in a public and open way to all the dates and territorial dynamics of the diffusion of the chains. The first identification of this variant dates back to half of last December 2020 and it concerns precisely 33 cases in the United Kingdom and connected to Nigeria, even if the sequencing data in the African country are not statistically significant.