Concern new Lambda variant could be resistant to vaccines

World health experts are concerned a new variant of the coronavirus could be resistant to vaccines.

The Lambda variant, formally known as C.37, was first reported in Peru, and accounts for more than 80 per cent of the nation's cases.

It has been detected in at least 26 countries, including the UK, the Independent reports.

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On June 14, the World Health Organisation (WHO) listed the Lambda strain as a variant of interest.

Just a few days later Public Health England (PHE) declared it was a "variant under investigation". PHE scientists said they were concerned the strain could spread quicker and be more resistant to vaccines or antibody treatments.

But PHE stressed that there is no evidence the Lambda variant causes more severe disease or reduces the effectiveness of current vaccines.

What is the research on Lambda?

Concerns are based around a study in Chile based on tests of health workers who had received two doses of China's CoronaVac Vaccine.

Results suggested the Lambda variant was more infectious than the Alpha (UK) or the Gamma (Brazil) variants.

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The Lambda variant also had a higher "immune escape" of antibodies produced by vaccines compared with Alpha and Gamma.

"Our data show for the first time that mutations present in the spike protein of the Lambda variant confer increased infectivity and escape to neutralising antibodies elicited by the inactivated virus vaccine CoronaVac," the paper said.

The study, published on July 1, did not look at other vaccines and the effects of the Lambda variant.

'Unusual' mutations

The Lambda variant had "unusual' mutations, Jeff Barrett, director of the COVID-19 Genomics Initiative at the Wellcome Sanger Institute in the UK, said.

It has a unique pattern of seven mutations in the spike protein that the virus uses to infect human cells, Dr Barrett told the Financial Times.

"One reason why it is hard to make sense of the threat from Lambda, using computational and lab data, is that it has rather an unusual set of mutations, compared with other variants," he said.

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