The incidence of XEC variant of the coronavirus is increasing significantly. Since its appearance with the first cases in Germanycountries like United Kingdom, Denmark, France, Ireland, Sweden, Slovenia, Belgium, Italy and the Netherlands They have also reported a higher incidence. Also in Spain, where it accounts for around 1% of total cases.
It is the second most common strain in cases registered in September, although still far from the main one KP.3.3with an incidence of 13%.
The concern lies not so much in its effects, but in its transmission speed: Experts maintain that the strain contains mutations that can make it easier to infect, since it has emerged from other subvariants of Omicronwhich in turn was one of the most contagious.
Dr Helen Wall stated in an interview in Manchester Evening News that XEC is increasingly prevailing over cases with other variantsalthough the reason is not clear: “We suspect it is because it is more contagious, but we do not fully know the situation. At the moment, it seems more like a flu than other previous variants of Covid.”
“We only know the cases that we see in hospitals, which affect the sickest people, because that is what is being evaluated at the moment,” adds the doctor, who insists that practically all cases are closer to a fluwith all the effects that entails, than the previous assumptions that have been faced with patients with Covid.
Symptoms of the new XEC variant of Covid
These are the most common symptoms in those affected with the XEC variant:
- High fever.
- Tos.
- Body pain.
- Headache.
Thus, the main symptoms differ from previous cases, in which difficulty breathing, fatigue, sore throat, nasal congestion or nausea, among others, also appeared.
