Researchers in southern Brazil said that a confirmed case of simultaneous infection with two variants of the Chinese communist virus was found earlier, a world first. Scientists are concerned that there may be multiple variants of the virus spreading in Brazil and that the presence of both variants in the same person may exacerbate the mutation of the virus.
The study was published on Wednesday (27) on the medical website medRxiv, but was not peer-reviewed. The two patients, who are in their 30s, were diagnosed in late November last year and were later tested for the P.2 variant of the virus (B.1.1.28 spectrum) that appeared in the state of Rio de Janeiro; they were also infected with a second variant of the virus, with symptoms such as dry cough, sore throat and headache.
Lead researcher Fernando Spilki, a viral expert at the University of Fivale, Rio Grande do Sul, said co-infection could produce new variants more quickly and would be another pathway for the virus to evolve. Mutations of the virus could also pose a greater risk of transmission and may be resistant to vaccines currently being developed. He speculated that there should be a large spread of multiple variants of the virus in Brazil in order for a co-infection to occur.
Of the variants that have emerged so far, the British strain is more infectious and lethal, the South African strain weakens vaccine efficacy, and the Brazilian strain has a strong ability to reinfect.
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