Scientists at the Africa Center of Excellence for Genomics of Infectious Diseases (ACEGID) at the Redeemers University, Ede, Osun State gas said the new Covid-19 variant that is currently causing concern in Europe is now in Nigeria.
Njenje Media News reports that the the new variant named “Lineage B.1.1.7” has caused a high rate rise of number of COVID-19 cases in the United Kingdom.
In a publication published on the website for the Global Genomics Community named ‘Virological’, the scientists claimed they found the same “Lineage B.1.1.7” variant in Osun State, Nigeria as early as the 3rd of August when the first sample was taken.
In their words;
“The B.1.1.7 lineage we found in Nigeria, predating the one described in the UK, has also been observed to rise rapidly in the UK over the past four weeks, indicating the plausible increased spread of the virus by specific non-synonymous mutations in the spike protein,” Professor of molecular biology and genomics who is also the Director at the Africa Centre of Excellence for Genomics of Infectious Diseases (ACEGID),Christian Happi said.
