A subvariant of the Delta which is spreading in the United Kingdom worries the health authorities of the country. The new form of the virus seems a priori more transmissible, but not more dangerous.
The “AY4.2” variant represented 6% of total cases in the UK last week, the UK Health Security Agency said in its weekly bulletin, which classified it as “variant under investigation”.
It does not therefore represent a “worrying variant” and is not for the moment decked out with a Greek letter.
“Preliminary evidence seems to prove that it has a higher transmission rate compared to the Delta,” said the British public health agency.
“More evidence is needed to determine if this is related to a change in the behavior of the virus or to epidemiological conditions,” she added.
On the other hand, this variant does not cause more hospitalizations and “does not appear to cause a more serious version of the disease or to make the vaccines currently distributed less effective”.
This new variant does not therefore appear to be likely to modify the trajectory of the pandemic. But the AY.4.2 variant proves that SARS-CoV-2 still has the potential to evolve into new, more transmissible mutations.
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