A coronavirus variant which Vietnam authorities thought was a combination of the Indian and UK strains is not a new hybrid but part of the existing Indian strain, the World Health Organization’s (WHO) representative in Vietnam told Nikkei.
“There is no new hybrid variant in Vietnam at this moment based on WHO definition,” Kidong Park said in an online interview with the newspaper, adding that it was within the delta variation that originated in India.
Last Saturday, the health minister of Vietnam said authorities there have detected a new coronavirus variant that is a combination of the Indian and UK COVID-19 variants and spreads quickly by air. Health Minister Nguyen Thanh Long said then that laboratory cultures of the new variant showed the virus replicated itself very quickly, possibly explaining why so many new cases had appeared in different parts of the country in a short period of time.
The WHO has identified four variants of SARS-CoV-2 of global concern. These are variants that emerged first in India, Britain, South Africa and Brazil.
Vietnam previously detected seven virus variants: B.1.222, B.1.619, D614G, B.1.1.7 – known as the UK variant, B.1.351, A.23.1 and B.1.617.2 – the “Indian variant.”
