WHO assigns letters of the Greek alphabet to coronavirus variants – Worldwide

The United Nations World Health Organization (WHO) has assigned letters of the Greek alphabet to variants of the new coronavirus and recommends that these variants no longer be named in countries where these variants have been detected, as this could lead to negative emotions in those countries.

The British variant of the coronavirus is called the alpha variant, the South African variant is called the beta variant, the Brazilian variant is called the gamma variant, and the Indian variant is called the delta variant.

Such names have been agreed by the WHO Expert Group.

Naming coronavirus variants in the names of countries is stigmatizing and discriminatory for these countries, according to the WHO.

“To avoid this and simplify public communication, the WHO encourages national authorities, the media and others to adopt these new names,” the WHO said in a statement.

It adds that the new names, which use the letters of the Greek alphabet, will not replace the scientific names of the coronavirus variants. For example, the scientific name of the alpha variant is B.1.1.7.

More than 171 million people worldwide have been infected with the new coronavirus, and more than 3.5 million people have died from the Covid-19 virus.

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