COVID-19 | COVID-19 mutates more than twice as fast as seasonal flu

COVID-19 infections and hospitalizations are falling after a peak in August, but the outbreak is evolving SARS-CoV-2 Keep accelerating. According to the researchers, it accumulates mutations 6 to 10 times faster than other coronaviruses and 2.5 to 9 times faster than influenza strains.The latest product of this evolution has caught the attention of experts and is called JN.1 and descend from Wintergreen (BA.2.86), a hypermutated omicron subvariant that emerged in August.This JN.1 lineage has been discovered in Spain, and particularly in France, and experts are concerned because of its growing up very fast and evade immunity (due to vaccination or previous infection) shows up in the lab. She is a leading candidate to lead the foreseeable winter coronavirus surge.

Regarding this evolution, American scientists J. WeilandThe expert on statistical modeling of infectious diseases noted in his description of More seasonal. “

“Evolutionary Bias”

according to Eric Topolone of the pandemic’s leading scientists The mutation rate of the new coronavirus is more than twice that of seasonal influenza, and “is a prototype of rapid evolution.”American scientists pointed out “Evolutionary Bias” Tracking the Pirola sub-variant will make it harder for our immune systems to recognize the virus and neutralize it.

Vaccine boosters currently in use are suitable for the XBB.1.5 subvariant and are thought to be suitable for subvariants of the same evolutionary branch, such as EG.5.1 and HV.1, with which they share some mutations .However, JN.1 comes from a different place: it includes Relative to its ancestor BA.2, there are more than 40 mutations, 34 of which are in the spike proteinour body’s vaccines and antibodies are against it.

Topol said laboratory data on the properties of BA.2.86 (pirola) and its descendant JN.1 are “concerning.”The Columbia University report published in the journal Nature reinforces similar findings from other laboratories that BA.2.86 has a very high affinity for the cellular receptor ACE2, which may cause greater spread

.

JN.1 contains a mutation (L455S) thought to be key in promoting greater evasion of our immune response and has been shown to have a higher growth advantage. “We won’t know for a few weeks whether JN.1 is linked to the significant increase in Covid, nor the extent to which our immune responses will protect us from previous vaccines, infections and new boosters based on XBB.1.5 impact,” said. poplar.

Another world-renowned scientist writes a lengthy article for JN.1 William A. HaseltineThe former professor at the Harvard School of Public Health called this subvariant “a stranger in the Omicron sublineage” in Forbes.He noted that it has 40% different mutations compared to XBB.1.5, some of which (e.g. E484K and P681R

) appeared in concerning alpha and beta variants in early 2021 and later disappeared with omicron.

Canadian evolutionary biologist T. Ryan Gregory He had already warned in an interview with Prensa Ibérica organization FARO in September that there was a selective pressure for immune escape that did not exist before so many people developed a level of immunity through vaccines or infection. “We have to pay attention to the descendants of BA.2.86 (pirola),” he warned, regarding the mutations it might acquire in the future. JN.1 is one of these descendants.