At first we feared the type of coronavirus that spread from the UK, and now we look with frightened eyes at India, where another mutation is slowly being transmitted. The so-called B.1.617 variable has now appeared in at least seventeen countries, but how dangerous is that?
At the moment, the Indian variant appears to be 15 percent more contagious, so it is not as dangerous as the British boom. Therefore, the World Health Organization has not classified B1.617 as “of concern”. The WHO has previously done this using the Brazilian, British and South African alternative. This means that the World Health Organization assumes that the Indian version of the coronavirus does not spread more easily, lead to more serious diseases or that current treatments do not work against it.
Vaccine manufacturer Pfizer has already announced that its vaccine is likely to protect against the Indian variant. The famous Belgian virologist Stephen van Gucht believes that this also applies to other vaccines. “We see that the classic vaccines still provide good protection against dangerous forms of the variants, including AstraZeneca vaccines. There is absolutely no indication that this will not be the case.”
