In the nearly five years since the emergence of the Covid-19 virus, you would be forgiven for forgetting the number of latest variants we’ve seen. Some have had a greater impact than others, but documented by virologists hundreds.
The latest variant that is making headlines it’s called XEC. This omicron subvariant has been reported mainly in the northern hemisphere, but is now occurring detected in Australia too.
So what do we know about XEC?
Is Covid still relevant?
People are less more likely to test for Covid-19 and fewer more likely to report it. Enthusiasm for track the virus generally decreasing.
However, Australia continues to gather data and report Covid data. Although the number of cases is more likely to be much higher than documented (approx This 12 months already 275,000), we can still tell when we see significant waves in comparison with periods of lower activity.
Australia has recorded its latest peak in Covid-19 cases of the 12 months June 2024. Since then, the number of cases has been declining.
But SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid, is actually still around.
What variants are currently in circulation?
Main Covid variants currently circulating around the world are BA.2.86, JN.1, KP.2, KP.3 and XEC. They are all descendants of Omicron.
This is the first time the XEC variant has been detected in Italy in May 2024, the World Health Organization (WHO) described it as a variant “under monitoring”in September.
From the moment of detection XEC has spread to over 27 countries in Europe, North America and Asia. As of mid-September, the highest number of cases were found in countries equivalent to the United States, Germany, France, the United Kingdom and Denmark.
XEC is currently catching up 20% of cases in Germany, 12% in the UK AND in the USA about 6%..
Photo: Center for Aging Better/Pexels
Although XEC stays a minority variant worldwide, it appears to have a growth advantage over other circulating variants. We don’t know why yet, but reports suggest it might be possible spread more easily than other variants.
For this reason, it is predicted that XEC may turn into the dominant variant worldwide in the coming months.
How about Australia?
Latest Australian Respiratory Surveillance Report it has been noted that an increasing proportion of sequenced XECs has been observed recently.
In Australia, 329 SARS-CoV-2 sequences collected from August 26 to September 22 were uploaded to the website AusTrakkaAustralia’s National Genomics Surveillance Platform for Covid-19.
The most sequences (301 of 329, or 91.5%) are JN.1 sublines, including KP.2 (17 of 301) and KP.3 (236 of 301). The remaining 8.5% (28 of 329) were recombinants consisting of a number of omicron sublineages, including XEC.
Estimates based on data from GISAID, the international repository of viral sequences, suggest that XEC is catching up about 5% of cases in Australia or 16 of 314 samples were sequenced.
Queensland reported the highest rates over the last 30 days (8% or eight of 96 sequences), followed by South Australia (5% or five of 93), Victoria (5% or one of 20) and New South Wales (3% or two out of 71). WA recorded zero sequences out of 34. No data was available for other states and territories.
What do we know about XEC? What is a recombinant?
The XEC variant is believed to be the recombinant descendant of two previously identified omicron subvariants, KS.1.1 and KP.3.3. Recombinant variants arise when two different variants infect a number at the same time, allowing the viruses to swap genetic information. This results in the emergence of a brand new variant having features of each “parent” lines.
KS.1.1 belongs to a bunch commonly often called “FLiRT” variantswhile KP.3.3 is one of the “FLuQE” variants. Both of these groups of variants have contributed to the emergence of recent ones increase in the number of Covid infections throughout the world.
WHO naming conventions for brand new COVID variants, letter combos are sometimes used to designate latest variants, particularly those who arise from recombination events between existing lineages. “X” normally means: recombinant variant (equivalent to XBB), while the letters following it discover specific lineages.
So far, we know little about the features of XEC and the way it differs from other variants. However, there is no evidence to suggest that symptoms might be more severe than with earlier versions of the virus.
We only know what mutations this variant has. In the S gene encoding the spike protein, we find the T22N mutation (inherited from KS.1.1), in addition to Q493E (from KP.3.3) and others mutations
known to omicron pedigree.
Will vaccines still work well against XEC?
Latest monitoring data doesn’t show a big increase in the number of hospitalizations because of Covid-19. This suggests that current vaccines still provide effective protection against the severe effects of circulating variants.
As the virus continues to mutate, vaccine firms will proceed to accomplish that proceed to update your vaccines. Both Pfizer and Moderna have updated vaccines targeting the JN.1 variant, which is the parent strain of the FLiRT variants and due to this fact should protect against XEC.
However, Australia is I’m still waiting to seek out out which vaccines could also be made available to the public and when.
In the meantime, omicron-based vaccines equivalent to the current XBB.1.5 spikevax (Moderna) or COMIRNATY (Pfizer) vaccines are still more likely to provide good protection against XEC.
It’s hard to predict how XEC will behave in Australia once summer arrives. We will need more research to higher understand this variant because it spreads. However, provided that XEC was first detected in Europe during the northern hemisphere summer months, this suggests that XEC could also be well-suited to spread in warmer weather.