Covid-19: As Delta spreads, new variant Epsilon emerges in 34 nations
Virendra Pandit
New Delhi: Even as the Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2, causing Covid-19, has spread to over 130 countries, a new strain, Epsilon— vaccine-resistant and highly transmissible–has surfaced in 35 nations. It has also infected people in neighboring Pakistan where, as in the US and China, restrictions are being re-imposed due to an increase in infection numbers.
The Epsilon variant (CAL.20C), first found in California in 2020, has been detected in at least five patients of Pakistan, media reported on Monday.
These cases, first detected in Lahore, alarmed Pakistani officials, forcing them to issue an alert, as the variant, believed to be the second-most dominant variant in New York, has been called vaccine-resistant and almost as highly transmissible as the Delta variant.
In April and May, India witnessed the devastating effects of the Delta variant (B.1.617.2), which had similar attributes, with a second wave of the pandemic increasing fatalities manifold and stretching the country’s healthcare system to the limits.
The Epsilon variant has five defining variations. It had earlier been declared a “Variant of Concern” (VOC) by the United States’ Center for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC) but downgraded on June 29 to a “Variant of Interest” (VOI).
Apart from the United States, it has been found in 34 nations. In February 2021, the strain accounted for around 15 percent of the total cases in America.
According to researchers at the University of Washington, Epsilon is more resistant to vaccines and “can completely escape lab-made antibodies and reduce the effectiveness of the antibodies generated in the plasma of vaccinated people”. The ability to neutralize this variant has been reported to diminish 2.5 to 3 times in vaccinated people’s blood plasma.
Besides, Epsilon is also 20 percent more transmissible than the preceding coronavirus strains.
While the US downgraded Epsilon, the CDC recently sounded an alarm on the Delta variant, calling it as easily spreading as ‘chicken pox’. It said Delta may cause more severe disease than all other known versions of the virus, media reported.
