Hybrid of British and Indian COVID variants found in Vietnam

Vietnam has detected a new variant of the COVID-19 coronavirus, according to Vietnam’s Minister of Health, Nguyen Thanh Long. According to the minister, this variation is a hybrid between the Indian and British variants, which is spreading rapidly through the air, as reported by the online newspaper ‘VnExpress’ and picked up by Reuters.

REUTERS reporting a UK and Indian variant hybrid… Vietnam detects hybrid of Indian and UK COVID-19 variant https://t.co/niBZaKAY7J

— Nicola Gray (@Nikikgray) May 29, 2021

“After carrying out genetic sequencing on new patients, we have discovered a new variant that is a mixture of the Indian and UK variant,” said the health minister, who specified that it is an Indian variant “with mutations that originally belonged to the British variant”.

After successfully containing the spread of COVID for most of last year, Vietnam is now facing a more rapidly spreading outbreak. Laboratory tests have revealed that the virus replicates itself very quickly in the new variant, which could explain why so many cases have been detected in so many areas in such a short period of time.

-Thailand News (TN)