Covid-19: Pirola, the new variant under surveillance

In the family of Omicron variants, a new arrival has appeared. On August 17, the WHO announced that it was closely monitoring a new A.2.86 variant later named Pirola, marked by numerous mutations. This situation highlights the importance for all countries to maintain their surveillance efforts, according to the organization.



If scientists indicate that they still lack information on Pirola, but if this variant is already attracting attention it is because “a significant number of mutations which could help the virus to escape the immune response”. However, so far the Pirola variant does not appear to be associated with particularly specific symptoms. Based on the limited data available, they are similar to the flu, with a fever of 38°C for a few days, a severe cold and headache. As with some of the latest variants to appear, it is no longer characterized by asymptomatic cases.



At the end of July this new variant was discovered in Denmark. It has since been detected in South Africa, the United States, Israel and the United Kingdom, in Spain and since this Thursday it has been identified in France.

Currently “nine sequencing of BA.2.86 have been reported in five countries: three in Europe, one in Africa and one on the American continent,” indicates the WHO in its epidemiological bulletin of August 23.



The data is still fragmentary, but some scientists are already sketching possible trajectories. Pirola “has all the characteristics of something that could take off, however, our immune landscape is now complex, so it is too early to say that this will be the case but I think it is possible,” says Kristian G. Andersen, researcher Danish in infectious diseases and genomics.



For François Balloux, professor of computational biology at University College London, “BA.2.86 is the most striking strain of Sars-CoV-2 that the world has witnessed since the emergence of Omicron [...] Even in a worst-case scenario, where BA.2.86 causes a new wave of cases, we do not expect to see comparable levels of severe illness and death as we saw earlier in the pandemic when the Alpha strains , Delta, or other Omicron sub-variants have spread.

  Sophie de Duiéry

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