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Why Are We Punishing South Africa for Omicron?
Over thirty countries have imposed border restrictions on southern Africa — closing down the region’s tourism.
On November 24th, South Africa reported a new heavily mutated variant of SARS-CoV-2 (B.1.1.529) with over thirty mutations to the viral spike protein. Two days later the World Health Organization (WHO) classified it as a Variant of Concern — Omicron — which prompted nations worldwide to impose travel bans on southern Africa.
Laboratory technicians at Lancet Laboratories in Pretoria, South Africa, first raised concerns over a new variant in early November, when some of the samples they were testing for SARS-CoV-2 by PCR appeared to be missing one of their target genes. The suspicious samples were latter sequenced by Portuguese scientist Raquel Viana at Lancet’s facilities in Johannesburg.
The genomic sequences of the viruses showed a large number of mutations, especially to the S gene which encodes the spike protein responsible for the binding of the virus to host cells and the main target of the immune response. Because of these changes the PCR tests did not recognizing the new S gene — this is known as an S gene dropout, a feature previously detected only in the Alpha variant.
