Topline The infectious coronavirus variant first identified in the U.K. is likely to become the dominant form of the virus worldwide, the director of the country’s genetic surveillance program said Thursday, as she predicted that scientists will be hunting for potentially dangerous new mutations of the virus for the next ten years. A British expert predicts the country’s variant will “sweep the world” after becoming the dominant … [+] virus in the U.K. getty Key Facts Professor Sharon Peacock, a Cambridge academic and director of the Genomics U.K. Consortium, said the now-dominant variant in the U.K. had “swept the country” and is “going to sweep the world.” Studies have shown that the variant, known as B.1.1.7, is significantly more infectious than existing strains and potentially more deadly. While current vaccines appear to work against the U.K. variant, Peacock said new mutations could be “particularly problematic with vaccines,” adding that they will likely need to be “tweaked” in the future. Peacock said the U.K. variant was already mutating in ways that could undermine vaccination efforts, pointing to “five separate times” it had acquired one of the same vaccine-threatening mutations seen in South African and Brazilian variants, making it likely the virus will trouble scientists for years to come. “Once we get on top of (the virus) or it mutates itself out of being virulent – causing disease -… Click below to read the full story from Forbes
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Top Scientist Says Contagious U.K. Covid-19 Variant Likely To ‘Sweep The World’
