New Covid-19 variant now present in 27 countries

A new variant of Covid-19 is now present in hundreds of patients across 27 countries in Europe, North America and Asia, according to an analyst.

The variant, XEC, was first detected in Germany in June. It was also reported in the UK, US, Denmark and other countries.

Experts say the strain is now ‘taking charge’ and will likely continue to spread globally.

“There has been particularly strong growth of XEC in Denmark and Germany,” Mike Honey, the analyst, told British news outlet Independent.

Scripps Research, which tracks data from the global initiative on sharing all influenza data (GISAID), says the strain has been detected in at least 15 countries and 12 US states.

The 15 confirmed European countries are Slovenia, Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, Denmark, Taiwan, France, Israel, Italy, Sweden, Ireland, the United Kingdom, Canada, Spain and the United States.

“XEC’s prevalence is lower in the US and Canada and reached a high of 5.96% in European cases on 19 August. Slovenia had high rates of infection with the variant in August with over 10 per cent of samples from the country containing XEC,” the Independent said.

According to BBC, the variat has some new mutations that might help it spread this autumn, although vaccines should still help prevent severe cases, experts say.

For those more likely to become seriously ill from Covid, the NHS offers a free booster shot.

The vaccines have been updated to better match recent variants, although not XEC, which has emerged from earlier Omicron subvariants.

Prof Francois Balloux, Director of the Genetics Institute at University College London, told BBC News that although XEC has a "slight transmission advantage" over other recent Covid variants, vaccines should still offer good protection.

He says it is possible XEC will become the dominant subvariant over the winter though.