Back

SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern, variants of interest and lineage A.27 are on the rise in Cote d'Ivoire

Anoh, E. A.; Schubert, G.; Wayoro, O.; Pacome, M.; Belarbi, E.; Sachse, A.; Calvignac-Spencer, S.; Leendertz, F.; Diane, B.; Akoua-Koffi, C.

2021-05-07 epidemiology
10.1101/2021.05.06.21256282 medRxiv
Show abstract

SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern (VOC) and variants of interest (VOI) are heavily altering the COVID-19 pandemics course due to their increased transmissibility, virulence and immune escape abilities. Data on their spread in western sub-Saharan Africa is however still scarce. We therefore sequenced viral genomes from SARS-CoV-2 cases identified in central and northern Cote dIvoire between May 2020 and March 2021. We report the introduction of VOC B.1.1.7 as early as mid-January 2021, followed by detection of a single case of VOC B.1.351, as well as VOI B.1.525. Since early 2021 VOC/VOI are gradually dominating the SARS-CoV-2 virus pool in Cote dIvoire, as seen in other regions of the world. Intriguingly, we also find that another lineage, A.27, has also been on the rise over the same period. In sum, this study highlights again the extremely rapid local diffusion of VOC, VOI and possibly A.27, and the importance of further reinforcing capacities for genomic surveillance on the African continent.

Matching journals

The top 5 journals account for 50% of the predicted probability mass.

50% of probability mass above

"Similar papers" are the closest papers from that journal in the model's embedding space. They show what the match is built on, but the ranking comes mostly from a classifier over the whole training set, not from these examples alone.