Faizel Patel – 18/12/2020
The chairperson of the Ministerial Advisory Committee on COVID-19, Professor Salim Abdool Karim says the new variant of the Coronavirus in the second wave is spreading faster in South Africa than the first wave.
Professor Karim was briefing the media on Friday following the announcement by Health Minister Dr. Zweli Mkhize that South African scientists have identified a variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
Mkhize said a particular variant of COVID-19 has increasingly dominated the findings recent virus samples collected in the past two months.
Professor Karim says it is unclear whether SARS-CoV-2 virus is a new strain or merely a subtype of the coronavirus.
“It’s still very early, but at this stage the preliminary data suggests that the virus that’s now dominating in the second wave is spreading faster than the first wave. It’s not clear if the second wave has more or less deaths. In other words the severity is still unclear.”
Professor Karim says the new variant is unusual.
“We don’t know where it came from and we don’t know why it formed. We found the first of this virus in Nelson Mandela Bay, but we don’t know if it originated in Nelson Mandela Bay. It could’ve originated anywhere and somebody could’ve travelled there, or it could’ve started spreading there after being brought in.”
Professor Karim says it is unclear if the new variant is infecting people who were already infected during the first wave.
“We have no information to answer that question at this time. But has you heard from Professor Tulio De Oliviera we have two laboratories that are growing the virus in the African Research Institute (ARI) and we will start doing studies to answer that question. It’s not hard to answer that question, it just takes time.”
Professor Karim says the studies have to be conducted to determine if the COVID-19 vaccine works against the new variant.
Listen to the address by Professor Salim Abdool Karim
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