African and international organisations say low rates of vaccination on the continent could lead to Covid-19 mutations
The proliferation of Covid-19 variants in Africa, partly attributed to the low rates of vaccination on the continent, could lead to vaccine-evading mutations that complicate attempts to end the pandemic, a group of 112 African and 25 international organisations said.
The “slow rollout of vaccines in most African countries creates an environment in which the virus can replicate and evolve,” the organisations said. “This will almost certainly produce additional VOCs, any of which could derail the global fight against Covid-19.” The study showed that Covid-19 was introduced to most African nations from Europe, and in turn the continent has exported the variants it spawned back to European countries. Different strains of the virus spread around the continent mainly from SA, Nigeria and Kenya - three of the African countries with the strongest links to the wider world.
The research is the first major output by Africa’s leading scientists in an effort to increase the continent’s ability to produce and analyse genomic data. Two variants in West Africa and East Africa, known as B.1.525 and A.23.1, need to be contained, it said.“There is strong evidence that both of these VOIs are rising in frequency in the regions where they have been detected, which suggests that they may possess higher fitness than other variants,” the scientists said.
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