Here's the latest variant picture for the "Global - Other" countries, to mid-May.

The NB.1.8.1 "Nimbus" variant is clearly dominant at 46%.

The XFG.* variant is another challenger, growing to 12%.

#COVID19 #GlobalOther #NB_1_8_1 #Nimbus #XFG
🧵 This perspective excludes all the high-volume countries and regions that I routinely report on: Australia, NZ, Europe, Canada and the US. The remaining countries are aggregated into this report.
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Here's the latest variant picture for the United States, to late May.

The LP.8.1.* variant was down to 37%.

The next challenger looks like XFG.*, which grew strongly to 24%.

The NB.1.8.1 "Nimbus" variant is also growing, up to 16%.

#COVID19 #USA #XFG #NB_1_8_1 #Nimbus
🧵 For the US, the XFG.* variant shows a strong growth advantage of 6.1% per day (43% per week) over LP.8.1.*, which predicts a crossover in late May (the data routinely lags).
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I’ve added a couple of pages to my main SARS-CoV-2 variant analysis dataviz, digging into the data for International Travellers.

The first page shows the Lineage L2 trends across all the International Traveller samples.

#SARS_CoV_2 #International
🧵 This is probably a more randomised sample than the "Global" aggregate of all samples submitted to GISAID, as those are dominated by the US and Canada
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XFP is the latest recombinant variant to be classified and incredibly it is the third of a recent set of recombinants with identical spike mutations. The earlier ones were XFJ and XFM.

I think of them as the "Doppelgängers".

#COVID19 #XFJ #XFM #XFP #Doppelgängers
🧵 Note "Doppelgänger" is not an agreed variant nickname, nor should it be. There doesn’t seem to be anything stopping other sets of variants or recombinants from ending up the same way, as multiple Doppelgänger packs.
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Hong Kong was the first country to report a wave driven by the new NB.1.8.1.* "Nimbus" variant.

Including it’s sub-variants, Nimbus has made a clean sweep of the landscape there.
#COVID19 #HongKong #NB_1_8_1 #Nimbus
🧵 Nimbus accounted for 100% of 50-odd recent samples collected since mid-April. I haven’t seen that happen anywhere since the JN.1 wave in late 2023.
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Here's the latest variant picture for my new " Global - Other" report, to mid-May.

The NB.1.8.1 "Nimbus" variant is clearly dominant at 43%.

The XFG.* variant is another challenger, growing to 9%.

#COVID19 #GlobalOther #NB_1_8_1 #Nimbus #XFG
🧵 This perspective excludes all the high-volume countries and regions that I routinely report on: Australia, NZ, Europe, Canada and the US. The remaining countries are aggregated into this report.
🧵

Here's the latest variant picture for the United States, to early May.

The LP.8.1.* variant continued to fall, down to 35%.

The next challenger is XFG.*, which grew strongly to 19%.

#COVID19 #USA #LP_8_1 #XFG #NB_1_8_1 #Nimbus
🧵 For the US, the XFG.* variant shows a strong and accelerating growth advantage of 6.4% per day (45% per week) over LP.8.1.*, which now predicts a crossover in late-May (the data routinely lags).
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Here's the latest variant picture with a global scope, to mid-May.

The NB.1.8.1 "Nimbus" variant has grown strongly to take over dominance at 27%.

The LP.8.1.* variant has fallen to around 27%.

The XFG.* variant grew to 12%.

#COVID19 #Global #NB_1_8_1 #Nimbus #LP_8_1 #XFG
🧵 Following the declaration by the WHO of NB.1.8.1 as a Variant Under Monitoring and as Nextstrain Clade 25B, I have separated that variant and its descendants into a new “L2” group, shown in Sky Blue.
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Australian COVID-19 cases update:

Reported Cases have continued to rise sharply at the national level and in most states & territories, with the 7-day average doubling in the last 2 weeks.

#COVID19 #Australia
🧵 The last time 800 cases/day were reported nationally was in late January, on the downslope of the XEC wave. The peak of this wave has not been reached.

As always, it is hard to be certain with this series; the data quality is very shoddy and the raw data is incredibly spiky.
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My work was used in a recent piece for The Conversation: "There’s a new COVID variant driving up infections. A virologist explains what to know about NB.1.8.1".

🧵theconversation.com/theres-a-new-c… The links in the paragraph starting "Genomic sequencing has confirmed NB.1.8.1 …" point to my report for Australia, from my regular variant analysis. I update that and my similar reports for other countries and regions weekly.
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Here's the latest variant picture for Europe (excluding the UK), to early May.

The LP.8.1.* variant continued to dominate, growing steadily to around 52% frequency.

#COVID19 #EUR #LP_8_1 #XFG #XDV #NB_1_8_1 #XFJ
🧵 The presumed next challengers are still at low frequencies but growing – XFG.* to around 10%, and XDV.* (led by NB.1.8.1) to around 6%, and also XFJ.* grew to 5%.
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Here's an animated map showing the spread of the NB.1.8.1 variant, and it’s child variants PQ.1 and PQ.2. The first sample was reported in England in January, but judging from it’s early spread, the origin was likely an undersampled region in Asia.
🧵 It was soon reported across Asia and Australia. Growth accelerated from late March and it is now showing up almost everywhere that is still sharing sequencing data.
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Here's the latest variant picture for the United States, to early May.

The LP.8.1.* variant has peaked and fell back to 52%.

The presumed next challengers are growing – XDV.* (led by NB.1.8.1) to 9% and XFG.* to 8%.

#COVID19 #USA #LP_8_1 #XFG #XDV #NB_1_8_1
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For the US, the XFG.* variant shows a strong but slightly slowing growth advantage of 5.2% per day (36% per week) over LP.8.1.*, which now predicts a crossover in early June.
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Here's the latest variant picture with a global scope, to early May.

The dominant LP.8.1.* variant has fallen to around 34%.

XDV.* (led by NB.1.8.1) is challenging, rising steadily to 18%.

#COVID19 #Global #LP_8_1 #XDV #NB_1_8_1
🧵 Globally, the XDV.* variant clan (led by NB.1.8.1) is showing a strong and accelerating growth advantage of 5.7% per day (40% per week) over the dominant LP.8.1.* variants. That now predicts a crossover in mid- May (the data routinely lags).
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Hong Kong is the first country to experience a wave driven by the new NB.1.8.1 variant.

From the Hong Kong surveillance report, wastewater is the most consistent indicator. That indicator is still trending upwards, to the highest level since mid-2023.
#COVID19 #HongKong
🧵 Analysis of the impact of the new NB.1.8.1 variant in Hong Kong might be informative for those awaiting that variant in other countries.

Here's my recent thread on that topic:

🧵skywriter.blue/pages/mikehone…

The Provisional Mortality statistics have been updated by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), up to January 2025.

Here are the deaths where the underlying cause of death was certified by a doctor as COVID-19 (22,357 deaths).
#COVID19 #Australia
🧵 Each individual death is represented by a single point, spread out across the years of the pandemic.

A relative low wave of COVID-19 deaths peaked in early January 2025, driven by the XEC.* variant.

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Here's the latest variant picture for the United States, to late April.

The LP.8.1.* variant appears to have peaked and fell back to 54%.

#COVID19 #USA #LP_8_1 #XFG #XDV
🧵 The presumed next challengers are growing – XFG.* to 11% and XDV.* (led by NB.1.8.1) to 6%.
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Here's the latest variant picture with a global scope, to late April.

Growth of the LP.8.1.* variant is holding at around 39%.

XDV.* (led by NB.1.8.1) looks like the next challenger, rising steadily to 13%

#COVID19 #Global #LP_8_1 #XDV #NB_1_8_1
🧵 Globally, the XDV.* variant clan (led by NB.1.8.1) is showing a strong but slowing growth advantage of 5.1% per day (36% per week) over the dominant LP.8.1.* variants. That now predicts a crossover in late May.

Strong growth advantages point to higher waves than for LP.8.1.*.
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With the LP.8.1.* variant dominant from the global perspective, it is time to ponder which variant might drive the next wave.

The leading contenders at this point are XDV.* (led by NB.1.8.1), and XFG.*.
#COVID19 #NB_1_8_1 #XFG
🧵 I show them above using a log scale, so you can compare their growth rates vs the dominant LP.8.1.*. Note the recent sample volumes are quite low, so the right side of this chart might not be a representative picture.
🧵

Here's the latest variant picture for the United States, to mid-April.

The LP.8.1.* variant growth continued to around 61%, but may have peaked.

The presumed next challengers – XFG.* and XDV.* (led by NB.1.8.1) are still below 5%.

#COVID19 #USA #LP_8_1 #XFG #XDV
🧵
For the US, the XFG.* variant shows a strong growth advantage of 5.9% per day (41% per week) over LP.8.1.*, which predicts a crossover in late May.
🧵

Here's the latest variant picture with a global scope, to late April.

Growth of the LP.8.1.* variant appears to have peaked, and fell to around 39%.

XDV.* (led by NB.1.8.1) looks like the next challenger, rising strongly to 11%

#COVID19 #Global #LP_8_1 #XDV
🧵 Globally, the XDV.* variant clan (led by NB.1.8.1) is showing a strong growth advantage of 5.5% per day (39% per week) over the dominant LP.8.1.* variants. That predicts a crossover in mid-May.

That could point to higher waves than those seen for LP.8.1.*.
🧵