Researchers at Columbia University School of Medicine are warning that a new variant of coronary disease is spreading rapidly in New York City and has the same worrisome characteristics as the variant found in South Africa, making it more contagious and problematic.
The new strain, called B.1.526, was first identified in samples collected in New York last November and accounted for about 12 percent of the cases in New York by mid-February.
Columbia researchers noted that analysis of publicly available databases showed that the South African and Brazilian variants were not found in significant numbers in recent samples collected in New York City and surrounding areas.
“Instead, we found large numbers of this indigenous variant strain,” Anne-Catrin Uhlemann, assistant professor of infectious diseases at Columbia’s College of Physicians and Surgeons, said in a statement.
The Columbia study found that B.1.526 shares some worrisome characteristics with B.1.351, originally found in South Africa, and P.1, first found in Brazil.
Several studies have shown that these new variant strains are more resistant to some existing vaccines than earlier versions of the coronavirus.
The researchers emphasized that their main concern is that these coronaviruses have a mutation in one site of the spine protein, called E484K, which is currently present in all three variant strains.
The E484K mutation is believed to weaken the human immune response.
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