New Delhi: The top US disease control agency is tracking a new, highly mutated lineage of the virus that causes COVID-19. The lineage is named BA.2.86, and has been detected in Israel, Denmark and the United States.
“CDC is tracking a new lineage of the virus that causes Covid-19. This lineage is named BA.2.86, and has been detected in the United States, Denmark and Israel. CDC is gathering more information and will share more about this lineage as we learn it,” the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said in a post on messaging platform X.
Earlier, the World Health Organization (WHO) said that it had classified BA.2.86 as a “variant under monitoring” due to the large number of mutations it carries. The global health agency said that, so far, only a few sequences of the variant have been reported from a handful of countries.
All viruses, including SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19, change over time, according to WHO. Most changes have little to no impact on the virus’s properties. However, some changes may affect the virus’s properties, such as how easily it spreads, the associated disease severity, or the performance of vaccines, and therapeutic medicines.
In a statement posted on X, WHO said more data are needed to understand this COVID-19 variant BA.2.86 and the extent of its spread, but the number of mutations warrants attention. “WHO is tracking 3 variants of interest and 7 variants under monitoring at the moment. WHO continues to call for better surveillance, sequencing, and reporting of #Covid19 as this virus continues to circulate and evolve,” the agency added.
Explaining the new lineage to Reuters, Dr S. Wesley Long, medical director of diagnostic microbiology at Houston Methodist, said it has 36 mutations from the currently-dominant XXB.1.5 Covid variant “harkens back to an earlier branch” of the virus.
He said it remains to be seen whether BB.2.86 will be able to out-compete other strains of the virus or have any advantage in escaping immune responses from prior infection or vaccination.
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