The Delta variant of the coronavirus spawned a strain of its own that is gaining considerable attention these days since it was dubbed “Delta-plus” in India.
It is a slightly different variant of the original Delta, which was also identified for the first time in that country. The latter is about two times more transmissible than other strains of the coronavirus, which means that unvaccinated people are more likely to become infected in case of exposure.
The UK was forced to delay a new phase of reopening its economy when the variant began to spread among unvaccinated people there, again leading to an increase in cases and hospitalizations.
The Delta contagion is an obvious cause for concern. But what about the Delta-plus?
According to the statements issued by the Indian government, the characteristics of Delta-plus also include increased transmissibility. But it is not clear if the strain is even more transmissible than the regular Delta variant.
For California scientists, there is not enough evidence to suggest that Delta-plus is more problematic than the original Delta. “It has a good name,” said Dr. Benjamin Pinsky, director of the Clinical Virology Laboratory at Stanford University. But there is not much information available to suggest it is worse than anything else out there, and more research is needed, he noted. “It sounds like another variant that is neither better nor worse than the regular Delta. It’s not clear why everyone is pushing the issue, ”said Dr. George Rutherford, an epidemiologist at UC San Francisco. “I don’t see that it is a big problem at the moment. I mean, it can get complicated; it can become a major inconvenience. But certainly there is nothing observable that worries me unduly right now. “
Dr. Monica Gandhi, an infectious disease expert at UC San Francisco, noted that the lack of data on Delta-plus is due, in part, to limited genomic surveillance in India due to limited funding.
“I don’t think much can be known yet, from the data we have, if it is really more transmissible or not,” he remarked.
Although the world continues to worry about increasingly contagious variants, according to some experts, at a certain point there will be a limit on transmissibility. Scientists do not expect this coronavirus to be as communicable as measles, one of the most contagious pathogens in the world. “I know it still seems like there are more and more, so it’s certainly understandable that people are asking, ‘Why doesn’t it stop?’” Gandhi said. “Once transmission is reduced, it will really stop accumulating mutations … That is why we want, of course, to have global equity in vaccines: stop transmission.”
The rise in more communicable variants is understandably concerning to scientists and public health experts. With the initial strains of coronavirus, it might take 71% of the population to be immune for a region to achieve “herd immunity,” in which ongoing transmission of the virus is interrupted, Rutherford explained. But a more transferable version, like the Delta, would make it necessary to raise that threshold, perhaps to 84%, he said. “Viruses mutate all the time,” he stressed. When it comes to Delta-plus, “they haven’t really figured out if it’s much worse or if it poses a new threat,” Rutherford added.
Health officials have already issued warnings about the original Delta variant, which has taken hold in some areas of the United States. From May 9-22, it accounted for less than 3% of genomically sequenced coronavirus samples nationwide. But from June 6 to 19, that proportion rose to more than 20%, according to figures released last week.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the US government’s leading infectious disease expert, called the strain “currently the greatest threat in America to the attempt to eliminate COVID-19.”
The proportion of coronavirus cases caused by the Delta variant recently increased in California, where it is known to have infected 372 people, according to figures from the state Department of Public Health.
According to the latest data, Delta is now the third most common variant in California, accounting for 14.5% of cases analyzed in June. The Alpha variant, identified for the first time in the United Kingdom, is found in 37.7% of the cases analyzed, and Gamma, registered for the first time in Brazil, is in 21.6%.
The data shows that the Delta variant is increasing its proportion of coronavirus cases in California, which are the lowest since the first weeks of the pandemic, 15 months ago.
In May, only 4.7% of the coronavirus cases analyzed were Delta, and it was the fourth most identified variant in the Golden State. That month, Alpha accounted for the majority of genomically sequenced cases in the state, with 58.4%, while Gamma was booked in 10.1% of the episodes.
A variant recognized for the first time in New York, B.1.526.1 (no Greek letter has been assigned), was identified in 5% of the cases analyzed.
The nation’s most populous county, Los Angeles, confirmed 123 cases of the Delta variant, 49 of them among residents of Palmdale and Lancaster. For the director of Public Health of the county, Bárbara Ferrer, that number “has occurred between mid-April and now”, so “you can see that we have had a large increase in the circulation of the Delta variant.” But, he continued, “if you are fully vaccinated, there is a lot of protection. In the case of that small number of people who got sick, even with their doses applied, they did not actually present a serious condition, ”the official said.
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