PRIMER
THE PIROLA COVID SUBVARIANT
The Pirola subvariant of coronavirus has hit the UK. Will it cause more severe disease? Will vaccines protect us? And could it lead to more lockdowns?
DISCOVERIES
Concern over a new strain of the COVID-19 coronavirus, labelled BA.2.86 and unofficially dubbed Pirola, is growing after it was designated a variant under monitoring by the World Health Organization.
At the time of writing, in early September, a few dozen cases had been confirmed worldwide. But what threat might this new variant pose? We asked Prof Paul Hunter, an expert on emerging infectious diseases at the Norwich Medical School of the University of East Anglia, for the lowdown.
WHAT IS BA.2.86 AND WHY IS IT A VARIANT UNDER MONITORING?
It’s a daughter of BA.2, an Omicron subvariant that appeared in November 2021. Pirola features more than 30 mutations not seen in BA.2. A year ago, we’d have said that anything with so many mutations is probably something we should be really concerned about. In the case of BA.2.86, however, most of the mutations have already been seen in other variants. So we already know a certain amount about it.