🇦🇹 Representative genomic surveillance of SARS-CoV-2 in Austria in week 42 across all regions. Nowcasting in dashed box shows the current situation. A collaboration of #AGES @agesnews and @IMBA_Vienna/@oeaw.
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BA.5 with R346T has reached ~25% now. New variants such as BQ.1(.1) and XBB show clear growth. BQ.1(.1) currently at ~8%, XBB<1%.
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Due to the good weather (see journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/a…) and declining case counts of BA.5 we currently observe a strong reduction in absolute numbers.
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The “vicious dozen” of mutations with currently particularly high selection pressure within the spike protein relative to BA.2 are listed below. Some are already present in BA.5, others are coming up now.
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For simplicity and to maintain oversight in the variant swarm, experts like @CorneliusRoemer and many others suggested binning variants into levels based on how many of those mutations they already picked up relative to BA.2. Austrian results:
So the calm before the storm will in all likelihood end in November with a change of weather and the new variants taking over. Rather abruptly...
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