Bavaria: What does the new virus variant mean?
Christiane Fux studied journalism and psychology in Hamburg. The experienced medical editor has been writing magazine articles, news and factual texts on all conceivable health topics since 2001. In addition to her work for, Christiane Fux is also active in prose. Her first crime novel was published in 2012, and she also writes, designs and publishes her own crime plays.
More posts by Christiane Fux All content is checked by medical journalists.A new variant of Sars-CoV-2 was found in the Garmisch-Partenkirchen Clinic on January 12th. The first research results of the Berlin Charité show that it is not the particularly contagious British mutation - nor the well-known South African and Brazilian mutations. What the southern Bavarian variant means is still open.
In a live broadcast on ZDF, the deputy medical director of the clinic, Dr. Clemens Stockklausner. He reported that two point mutations had so far been found on the spike protein of the virus (positions 69 and 70).
"Meaning still unclear"
“What this mutation means in itself is completely unclear. You have to wait for the sequencing to be complete, ”says Stockklausner. Whether further mutations would be found is still completely open, so the experts have to be given the necessary time.
“In addition, we cannot classify whether this has any clinical relevance at all,” says the doctor. So far, no evidence has been found that the affected patients became more seriously ill.
Nothing can be said about the future distribution either. "It is unclear whether this clone can spread further or whether it is now history."
35 patients and employees infected with the new variant
In the run-up to the discovery, a Sars-CoV-2 outbreak had occurred outside of the hospital's Covid-19 isolation ward. A total of 53 patients and 24 employees have become infected. The variant described has now been detected in 35 of them.
Overall, the outbreak is now under control on the stations. The health department is pursuing contacts at full speed.
All interventions that can be postponed have been stopped until further notice, but the hospital's emergency care will continue to be guaranteed. It is still unclear where the virus originally came from.
Recognize new mutations as early as possible
As part of the outbreak, the doctors examined the so-called PCR tests of the samples particularly meticulously. This should become the standard in all of Germany in the future, in order to be able to detect mutations of Sars-CoV-2 and their spread as early as possible.
"We were now the first, but in the following months we will be dealing with such variants again and again all over Germany," said Stockklausner.
