A new type of virus may have been discovered – a mixture of Delta and Omicron

This weekend, international media reported that researchers in Cyprus had identified about two dozen people infected with Covid, with a combination of a previously dominant delta variant and a highly contagious omicron variant said to be behind it. Researcher Leontios Kostrikis and his team have so far found 25 cases of this new variant that must have the same genetic background as delta, but with a total of ten omikron mutations.

In an interview with Sigma TV, Leontios Kostrikis says the future will show whether this new variant is more contagious than previous variants. However, he personally believes Omicron will outsmart her.

But this discovery was met with some skepticism. Professor Gekas Majorkinis, a member of the Greek Scientific Council, does not believe that a new variant has been found.

– the first independent analysis to show that this is a technical error in the laboratory in the process of reading the genome, According to the Cyprus Post newspaper.

Anders Sönnerborg, professor of clinical virology at the Karolinska Institutet, thinks something went wrong with the treatment.

– When I looked at the virus sequence from these 20+ cases, it likely appeared both in test tubes and in test tubes. There were some old deltas in the room, and since then the patient may have had omicrons. Or vice versa, as he says To Dagens Nyheter.

Magnus Jeslin, professor at the University of Gothenburg and chief physician in infectious diseases at Sahlgrenska Hospital, stresses that much remains unclear about the delta crown. The World Health Organization (WHO) has not yet determined whether it is a type of virus of particular interest. Magnus Gisslén thinks it’s important to keep track of the evolution, but he doesn’t think there is any reason to be overly concerned at the moment.

It’s hard to believe that it would be some kind of supervirus. “I think there’s a very small chance that it will spread very easily and compete with the microns and at the same time have a high risk of developing serious disease,” he says. to SVT.