According to a new study published in “The Lancet” by Chinese researchers that analyzed 413 samples from Beijing, between November 14 and December 20, it was found that “there is no evidence of the emergence of new variants” during this period.
A new study published in the specialized medical journal “The Lancet” showed that no new variant of Covid-19 appeared in Beijing, in the weeks after China abandoned its “zero Covid” policy at the end of last year.
China witnessed a significant increase in the number of HIV infections after the lifting of strict health measures, starting in early December, which raised fears that the largest country in the world in terms of population would become a fertile ground for new variants, more transmissible or more dangerous. As a result, many countries imposed new restrictions on travelers from China, citing Beijing’s lack of transparency about the scale of the outbreak.
However, according to a new study published in “The Lancet” by Chinese researchers that analyzed 413 samples from Beijing, between November 14 and December 20, it was found that “there is no evidence of the emergence of new variants” during this period.
More than 90% of infections were with the two sub-mutants of Omicron (BF.7) and (BA5.2), which were originally in China and which were overtaken in Western countries by more transmissible sub-mutants.
“Our analysis indicates that two previously known sub-mutants of Omicron were primarily responsible for the increase in the number of infections in Beijing, and possibly all of China,” said the study’s lead author George Gao, an epidemiologist at the Institute of Microbiology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
But Wolfgang Praiser and Tungay Mabunga, epidemiologists at Stellenbosch University in South Africa who were not involved in the research, cautioned that the study period covered only a few weeks, after China lifted its “zero Covid” measures. “If new variants appeared during the latest wave, it is likely that the study is too old to detect them,” they explained.
