By Henry Buzar August 23, 2020 Both Malaysia and the Philippines announced their discovery of a new coronavirus strain yesterday Aug. 16...
August 23, 2020
Both Malaysia and the Philippines announced their discovery of a new coronavirus strain yesterday Aug. 16, Sunday, putting the limelight to the two countries of a coronavirus disturbed world.
According to Star Asia News Network, the D614G mutation was discovered by the Malaysian Institute for Medical Research in four cases from two Covid-19 clusters in the country - the Sivagangga cluster and the Ulu Tiram cluster, said health chief Noor Hisham Abdullah in a Facebook post on Sunday.
In the Philippines, according to the Philippine Genome Center, the G614 strain, along with the original D614 genotype, was detected in a small sample of positive cases from Quezon City.
Is the mutated new strain dangerous?
In a July study published in the scientific journal Cell, experts found out that patients infected with the G614 variant had a higher viral load compared to those infected with D614, but it does not appear to be more deadly nor does it appear to increase the disease severity.
Datuk Dr. Hisham of Malaysia said that it's found to be 10 times more infectious and is easily spread by an individual 'super spreader'.
However, Lisa Gralinski of the University of North Carolina who is one of the few scientists in the world who specializes in coronaviruses averred that the strain is an overblown conclusion. “To say that you’ve revealed the emergence of a more transmissible form of SARS-CoV-2 without ever actually testing it isn’t the type of thing that makes me feel comfortable as a scientist.” She and other virologists I’ve spoken with who were not involved in the Los Alamos research agree that the paper’s claims are plausible, but not justified by the evidence it presents. More important, they’re not convinced different strains of the coronavirus exist at all.
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