Description | What is INSACOG? What are the findings on the SARS-CoV-2 variant?

So far: In early March, members of the SARS-CoV-2 Genome Consortium (INSACOG) in India, an advisory group of the central government, Warning about new contagious forms of New coronavirus.. last week, Shahid James, a prominent virologist and head of INSACOG, resigns Surprisingly from his post. Although he did not cite the reasons for his departure, Dr. Jameel said that aspects of the government’s treatment of the COVID-19 pandemic, especially with respect to data sharing, the emergence of new variants, and their role in the second wave of infection. I have criticized about. ..

What is INSACOG?

INSACOG, a consortium of 10 laboratories nationwide, is tasked with scanning COVID-19 samples from patient bands and reporting the presence of variants known to be rapidly increasing in infection internationally. I owe it. It is also a mission to check if a particular combination of mutations is more widespread in India. Some of these labs started scanning for mutations in April 2020, but that was not an Indian-wide effort. The laboratories involved are those with expertise in genome sequencing, from the Biotechnology Division, the Scientific and Industrial Research Council (CSIR), the Indian Medical Research Council (ICMR), and the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW). The laboratory was included. .. The National Center for Disease Control (NCDC) under MoHFW was tasked with coordinating the collection of samples from the state and associating disease with mutations. Work began in January by sequencing a sample of people who have traveled from the UK and a percentage of positive samples in the community.

What are the survey results?

According to a May 6 memo from the Biotechnology Division (DBT), 20,000 samples were sequenced and approximately 3,900 variants were identified.

The identified “foreign” mutants were mainly B.1.1.7 (first identified in the UK) and B.1.351 (first discovered in South Africa) and a few P2 mutants (from Brazil). did. However, some labs have flagged an increase in the presence of variants identified in India, which are grouped into interrelated families. A variant called B.1.617, also known as the “double mutant” variant, Mainly due to two mutations in peplomer (E484Q and L452R). These are individually identified elsewhere, but not together. However, there are many more mutations that contribute to various means in a way that is not fully understood in order for the virus to adapt to the human host.

The B.1.617 family has been marked as an international “variant of concern” after being associated with the recent surge in cases in the United Kingdom. In March, it was associated with a surge in incidents in Maharashtra. However, there is still no evidence that mutations are associated with increased severity of the disease. INSACOG Lab is also B.1.1.7 variantCharacterized by increased infectivity, is clearly more common in some states in northern and central India compared to southern states.

Why is genomic sequencing useful, as well as identifying patterns?

The purpose of genomic sequencing is to understand the role of specific mutations in increasing the infectivity of a virus. Some mutations are also associated with the virus’s ability to evade immunity, or antibodies, which affects vaccines.

Laboratories around the world, including many in India, have been studying whether the vaccines developed so far are effective against such variants of the virus. They do this by extracting the virus from a COVID-19-positive sample and propagating it well. Next, the serum of the person who has been vaccinated and has the antibody is collected. Scientists use a variety of probes to determine how much of the antibody thus extracted is needed to kill some of the cultured virus. In general, antibodies produced after vaccination (which also applies to Covaxin, Covishield, Pfizer, and Moderna jabs) were able to neutralize variants. However, few antibodies were produced against South Africa, Brazil, and the “double mutant” mutant.