Scientists Now Monitoring New Coronavirus Subvariant Spreading In The UK, Say It Could Be More Contagious Than Delta

The madness is never going to end with the coronavirus, is it? It doesn’t seem like the folks in charge are ever going to let things go, because to do so would mean that they won’t have an excuse to use as justification for usurping more freedom from the masses.

According to a new report from TheBlaze, a new COVID-19 subvariant that might end up being more contagious than the Delta variant, has started to spread around the United Kingdom. And many scientists from around the globe are taking notice.

Here’s more:

In a report issued last week, the U.K. Health Security Agency noted that AY.4.2, a descendant or sublineage of one of the Delta variants, has started to spread in the country and is now under “monitoring” status.

While data so far on the new subvariant is sparse, U.K. scientists said the viral strain “accounted for approximately 6% of all sequences generated” and was “on an increasing trajectory” in the week beginning Sept. 27.

According to BBC News, AY.4.2 was first discovered in July and had been slowly increasing since then, up until a few weeks ago, when the new subvariant’s trajectory rose signififcantly.

In a tweet thread posted on Saturday, University College London Genetics Institute Director Francois Balloux indicated that the subvariant may be 10% more contagious than the most dominant Delta variant, called AY.4, which erupted like wildfire across the globe during the late summer months.

“As such, it feels worthwhile keeping an eye on it,” Balloux went on to point, though he did add that early indications demonstrate that AY.4.2 is only “marginally” more transmissible than its parent strain.

“It’s nothing compared with what we saw with Alpha and Delta, which were something like 50% to 60% more transmissible,” he went on to say during an interview with the BBC.

“The new strain has not yet been elevated to a ‘variant of concern’ status by the U.K. government, and in other places where it has been found — such as in Denmark and the U.S. — it has not shown a notable upward trajectory,” TheBlaze reported.

However, the scientific community seems to be in agreement that further testing and continued monitoring is necessary.

It’s important to remember that the spread of this new subvariant could end up totally fizzling out. However, it should be noted that data that came out of the United Kingdom during the latter part of spring foreshadowed the spread of the Delta variant in the United States a few months later.