US detects ‘double mutant’ Indian strain of COVID

A new “double mutant” strain of the coronavirus has been discovered in San Francisco, marking the first time the variant, thought to be behind a surge of cases in India, has been identified in the US, Report informs referring to the US News.

The mutation is referred to as a “double mutant” because it carries two mutations that help the virus attach to cells, The San Francisco Chronicle reports.

The Stanford Clinical Virology Lab identified and confirmed one case of the variant that originated in India.

Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious diseases expert at the University of California San Francisco, told the Chronicle that the variant is the first time two mutations have been detected in the same virus.

“This Indian variant contains two mutations in the same virus for the first time, previously seen on separate variants,” Chin-Hong said. “Since we know that the domain affected is the part that the virus uses to enter the body, and that the California variant is already potentially more resistant to some vaccine antibodies, it seems to reason that there is a chance that the Indian variant may do that too.”

Initial results from trials conducted with vaccines currently approved for use in the US have shown that vaccines are still effective against variants, and Chin-Hong said he was ‘optimistic’ that they would also be effective against the ‘double mutant’ strain as well.