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Variants of concern. Summary from the US Centre for Disease Control. 

• https://covariants.org/per-country  ** Variants mix chart by country.   Very useful.

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• https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/variant-surveillance/variant-info.html#Concern 

• https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/science/science-briefs/scientific-brief-emerging-variants.html

• https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/transmission/variant.html   **

• https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#variant-proportions  **

• https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/variant-surveillance/variant-info.html#Concern  **  This web page also shows which variants of concern have which important mutations

• https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#global-variant-report-map    **  World map - which variant where

• https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/transmission/variant-cases.html   **   US map - which variant where

• https://outbreak.info/location-reports?loc=USA&selected=B.1.1.7&selected=B.1.617.2        Lineage (variant) prevalence in United States

• Translate greek symbol variant names to variant number  https://www.who.int/en/activities/tracking-SARS-CoV-2-variants/

  • Alpha B.1.1.7 UK variant

  • Beta  B.1.351 South African variant

  • Gamma P.1 Brazilian variant

  • Delta  B.1.617.2  Indian variant - more dangerous

  • Kappa B.1.617.1 Indian variant seemingly not as bad as B.1.617.2

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• Indian Delta Variant - the rising dominant variant 24/May/21     

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Royal Australian College of General Practitioners

• "Current COVID vaccines could be ineffective by next year: epidemiologists"

  • https://www1.racgp.org.au/newsgp/clinical/current-covid-vaccines-could-be-ineffective-by-nex  31March2021

    • "Two-thirds of epidemiologists who took part in a recent global survey have predicted it will be less than a year before SARS-CoV-2 mutates to such an extent that the majority of first generation COVID vaccines are rendered ineffective and new or modified candidates are required."

    • "Variants of concern have already emerged in South Africa, the US, India and Brazil, and Yale University’s Associate Professor Gregg Gonsalves said the fact that millions of people around the world are still contracting the disease means new mutations will arise every day."

    • ‘There is some concern that the AstraZeneca vaccine shows much less protection against the South African strain [B.1.351], but it was quite a small study that did not examine whether there was still protection against severe disease.'

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"What are the Indian, Brazil, South Africa and UK variants?"  24/Apr/21

• https://www.bbc.com/news/health-55659820 

  • "These strains of Covid-19 may be more contagious and dodge immunity to some extent.

    • The UK or Kent variant (also known as B.1.1.7) now dominant in much of Britain, has spread to more than 50 countries and appears to be mutating again

    • The South Africa variant (B.1.351) has found in at least 20 other countries, including the UK

      • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lineage_B.1.351#Oxford%E2%80%93AstraZeneca_(AZD1222)

    • The Brazil variant (also known as P.1) has now been found in the UK 

    • The Indian variant B.1.617 has some potentially important mutations (E484Q, L452R and P681R) that might help it escape some immunity, which is why experts are urgently studying it."

      • The title of the L452R paper , is "Transmission, infectivity, and antibody neutralization of an emerging SARS-CoV-2 variant in California carrying a L452R spike protein mutation"

        • "We identified a novel SARS-CoV-2 variant by viral whole-genome sequencing of 2,172 nasal/nasopharyngeal swab samples from 44 counties in California. Named B.1.427/B.1.429 to denote its 2 lineages, the variant emerged around May 2020 and increased from 0% to >50% of sequenced cases from September 1, 2020 to January 29, 2021"

      • Anne de Gheest's 30/Apr/21 Epidemiological update spends some time on the Indian variant. http://puzzlefinancialadvice.com.au/2021/COVID/Anne_de_Gheest_Epidemiological_COVID_update_210430.pdf   I don't think we really know how dangerous the Indian variant is just yet at this time 4/May/21. (not enough research on it yet)  Clearly Ann de Gheest is worried about it..... worried about the Indian variant getting into the USA. And Anne does point out that this variant has over 2 months, become dominant in India. (7min6sec into that video update).

      • More about the Indian delta variant here    

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"With Rise In Variants, Scientists Warn Of Evolutionary Arms Race Between Virus And Vaccines" 14/Apr/21

• https://www.wbur.org/commonhealth/2021/04/14/more-infectious-coronavirus-variants-overtake-massachusetts

  • The original coronavirus is being overtaken in Massachusetts by newer and more infectious variants. The Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard regularly sequences the genomes of coronaviruses taken from COVID-19 patients and, lately, the analyses have been showing more of these variants than the original or "wild-type" strain, which contains no major mutations.

  • “In the past few weeks and as of last night in particular, we are seeing over 50% of the cases we are sequencing at the Broad being variants of concern,” Bronwyn MacInnis, a genomicist at the Broad Institute, said at a state legislative hearing on Tuesday. “A large proportion of those being the B.1.1.7 variant first identified in the U.K., but also P.1, the variant first identified in Brazil.”

  • Barouch mentioned several concerning variants including the P.1 strain first identified in Brazil and domestic mutations that have emerged in California and New York, noting these variants “also have the property of being able to partially evade antibodies, and therefore raise the specter as to whether they may reduce vaccine efficacy.”

  • Scientists point to the rapid spread of these variants in their countries of origin and around the world as one line of evidence that they’re more infectious than the original coronavirus strain. In Brazil, the P.1 variant quickly became dominant in the country and surged into nearby nations. In the United Kingdom, the prevalence of B.1.1.7 rapidly overtook other coronavirus variants in multiple parts of the country.  

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Which variant has most immune evasion properties?

• Eric Topol's summary.   25/Apr/21

  • https://twitter.com/EricTopol/status/1386014651180146690

    • "An approximation of ascending immune evasion properties, with B.1.351 the highest that has been documented through multiple studies. And vaccine responsive. Antibodies to B.1.351 cross-react with other variants."