Research on possible mutation of coronavirus is underway, according to White House health advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci. He said that such mutation could help the pathogen spread.
Dr. Fauci said “there’s a little dispute" about the possible mutation of coronavirus. Viruses typically mutate and scientists mentioned before they traced minor mutations in the coronavirus that have not affected its capability to spread or infect anyone in any critical way.
Dr. Fauci cited a report on Cell, which was produced by investigators at Los Alamos National Laboratory. Virologists at Scripps Research in Florida also published about the mutation of coronavirus last month. They said it “enhances viral transmission," but it is not certain when the mutation might have happened.
“The data is showing there’s a single mutation that makes the virus be able to replicate better and maybe have high viral loads,” Fauci said in an interview with The Journal of the American Medical Association’s Dr. Howard Bauchner.
“We don’t have a connection to whether an individual does worse with this or not; it just seems that the virus replicates better and may be more transmissible," he added.
He noted that researchers are “still at the stage of trying to confirm that.”
The World Health Organization and its team of global researchers are monitoring over 60,000 different genetic sequences of the coronavirus taken from samples from different countries.
Viruses are known for mutating and evolving throughout their lifespan. RNA viruses like the coronavirus mutate swiftly than some other viruses, according to top WHO officials. Compared with human DNA, RNA viruses do not possess “natural error checking." This means that the virus' code cannot fix itself.
Dr. Soumya Swaminathan, the WHO’s chief scientist, said during a news briefing that “natural mutations” of the virus are likely. She mentioned certain “domains” of the virus that are “more critical,” like spike protein.
“If major mutations occurred in those domains, it might actually affect the development of vaccines,” she said.
Coronavirus surge
Dr. Fauci also expressed his concern about the recent surge in coronavirus cases. He believes it was caused by reopening too quickly and the public not following safety guidelines.
The infectious disease expert told the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee that the reason for the increase of coronavirus cases in the US was the swift reopening of economies.
“We’ve got to get that message out that we are all in this together,” Fauci said. “And if we are going to contain this, we’ve got to contain it together.”
Dr. Fauci, the top infectious disease expert at the National Institutes of Health, also said that he is “quite concerned” about what is happening in several states.
He noted that several states may have gone “too quickly” and dismissed some checkpoints required for a safe reopening.
The public acted as if all restrictions had been lifted even in areas where state and local officials observed the federal guidelines.
“What we saw were a lot of people who maybe felt that because they think they are invulnerable, and we know many young people are not because they’re getting serious disease, that therefore they’re getting infected has nothing at all to do with anyone else, when in fact it does,” Dr. Fauci said.
