Researchers may know soon if vaccines can beat coronavirus mutant
Researchers expect to know within weeks whether three of the Covid-19 vaccines tested in SA are effective against the highly contagious Sars-Cov-2 variant driving the country’s surging epidemic, according to a senior scientist at the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD).
The variant, known as 501Y.V2 was identified by scientists at the KwaZulu-Natal Research and Innovation Sequencing Platform last year, and has rapidly become the dominant strain circulating in SA. It is driving a huge resurgence in coronavirus infections that began in Eastern and Western Cape late last year, and is now taking off in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng. By Wednesday SA had recorded 1.278-million cases, a third of which were identified in the past month...
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