Many countries in the world are releasing their quarantine measures for the COVID-19 virus. However, recently, the mutant virus of COVID-19 spread very quickly to 85 countries in the world including South Korea. It has already become a dominant virus that leads to the COVID-19 virus infection.

▲ COVID-19 mutant virus

COVID-19 mutant virus was found in India last year. The dangerous problem of the virus is that if the quarantine measures are not enforced, the Infectious Reproduction Index (R) of the mutant virus is at least five and seven for maximum. Compared to the (R) of the original COVID-19 virus, the mutant virus is twice more infective than the original virus. According to PHE and ECDPC, 99 percent of the COVID-19 virus in the U.K are already mutant-virus infected, and mutant-virus infected will be over 90% of all of the COVID-19 virus-infected places in Europe in two months. In South Korea, they have reached 1,316 infected, which is the highest number of infected people in one day since the COVID-19 virus has spread in South Korea. By this, experts are expecting that there will be wave fourth vogue of COVID-19 virus in South Korea.

▲ R0 numbers of COVID-19 variants

Since the mutant virus does not have any vaccines, some experts are reporting that the COVID-19 virus might turn into the endemic virus, which is a kind of disease that happens annually such as the influenza virus. The Guardians also reported that humans might have to live with the COVID-19 virus annually, and they evaluated the COVID-19 virus as more infective than the Influenza virus because the speed of the infection is much faster, and the severity is higher. Experts are concerned about the infection of the mutant virus because the symptoms of the mutant virus are very similar to that of the common cold. The symptoms of the mutant virus are headache, cough, and fever, which make it much harder to find the infected.

COVID-19 virus has been making mutant viruses constantly since it spread to the world. Quarantine authorities of Canada are concerning about the infection of Lambda (C.37) virus which was discovered in Peru last August. Also, there are 11 mutant viruses that have possibilities of infection to the world.

▲ variants of COVID-19 virus

2021/07/17 by Jeon Seung Hyun