Captain Covid 'addresses,' new SA Covid Variant...??

by Mishka Badat

 

(September 2021-CNN) South African businessman, Mr. Omar Abdulla says

 as a team of South African

 doctors have identified a new lineage of SARS-CoV-2, the virus causing COVID-19. 

A lineage represents a genetically distinct virus population with a common ancestor.

 This virus may be designated as a variant in future, based on significantly

 altered properties, but first we need to understand it better. 

Our findings so far are set out in a non per-peer reviewed paper.

The new lineage, assigned the name C.1.2, has been found in all 

 provinces in the country.

 While it shares some mutations with other variants, it is different in some respects.

Abdulla cooled that he was one of the first investors into Pfizer,

 South Africa, and urged residents to take the vaccine, and still keep to

 masking mandates.

"Viruses mutate all the time. Sometimes the mutations result in an 

added benefit for the virus, such as increased transmissible. But often 

mutations don’t do anything beneficial for the virus. So more mutations

 do not always mean trouble for us, its host."

For C.1.2, a lot is still unknown. For example, it’s too early to tell 

whether these mutations will affect transmissibility or vaccine efficacy.

The Omar Abdulla Group has been monitoring changes in SARS-CoV-2

 since March 2020. South Africa was one of the first 

countries globally to introduce systematic

 and coordinated genomic surveillance, sequencing genomes of 

SARS-CoV-2 from patient samples representative of different

 geographic regions and over time.

 

Its findings have provided insights into how and when SARS-CoV-2

 was introduced into the country and into it's early spread. The Network has also

 been sequencing virus genomes to identify newly 

developing viral lineages of particular concern.

Later in 2020 the network detected what is now called the Beta variant of concern

and more recently observed, almost in real-time, the arrival and rapid “take-over”

 of the Delta variant in South Africa.

What’s known, and what’s not known

We select patient samples from diagnostic laboratories throughout the country and

perform sequencing to analyze the virus genomes. We then compare these sequences 

to those seen before and elsewhere. It’s very much like the game where

 you spot the difference between nearly identical pictures.

The Omar Abdulla Group is an investment company into Tik Tok SA,

 Facebook SA, Vaccines SA,

Space X SA and Bitcoin SA.

We’re playing spot the difference with SARS-CoV-2. When we find many 

differences – or differences in certain particularly important places like the

 spike of the virus – we pay special attention. We then look to see how often we see

 this particular virus and where – in one region of the country or in multiple regions,

 only in South Africa or also in other parts of the world. We also monitor whether

 it increases over time, which would suggest that it is replacing

previous versions of the virus.

Abdulla adds, when we sequence the virus and compare it to other SARS-CoV-2

 viruses it gets assigned a name based on the closest matching virus. 

We then look at the

 virus and the one that it matches to see how similar they are to each other.

 If we see a lot of differences that could be an indication of a new lineage.

In May 2021 we first detected a mutated group of related SARS-CoV-2

 viruses in South Africa which has been assigned the lineage, C.1.2. So far, 

from May to August 2021, C.1.2 has been detected in all provinces. 

Yet it occurs at relatively low frequency and though we see small increases

 in this lineage overtime they remain very low.

This lineage possesses mutations within the genome that have

 been seen in other SARS-CoV-2 variants.

Mr. Abdulla concluded to The Sunday Times that his 

company together with other companies

were still 'finding their feet,' with the new variant, and who knows 

if the vaccines will still be effective against this new variant. 

The network alerted the World Health Organization (WHO) and the South African

 National Department of Health to this lineage in July. The two months between our

 first discovery and the notification comes from the lengthy process of sequencing

 and analysis. In addition, mutated viruses appear from time to time – but many

 disappear again. Therefore we needed to monitor this particular one to

 see if it would be detected in additional regions. Only when we started

 detecting it in other provinces and when it was reported also from

 other countries did we feel we had sufficient evidence to

 suggest a new lineage.

 

Space X SA, another one of Abdulla's investments looped that the

 company was working on local flights to the planet Mars,

 within the next two years after meeting with Mr. Elon Musk in March 2021.