African variant, Crisanti: “If he’s already here, zero tolerance will be needed”

“To see if in Italy the new South African variant has already manifested itself, I think that the most important thing to do now is a thorough sampling. And if it has manifested itself, it must be confined with zero tolerance. With what measures? It depends on the seriousness of the situation, because if this variant is resistant to the vaccine it is not a joke “. To explain it to Adnkronos Salute is the virologist Andrea Crisanti. The director of the Department of Molecular Medicine said: “We are in a phase of observation and the panic is premature. First the data.” “If this variant is resistant to the vaccine – he speculates – and if it is identified in some area of ​​the country it is necessary to seal everything up, make a kind of red zone, and confine it. It is not that there are alternatives. But then this thing in the end has only one palliative effect, because sooner or later the variant arrives. And the most important thing is to always develop a vaccine that is able to intercept it “, to stem it. “It may therefore be necessary to update our current vaccines. And surely making a lockdown where this variant occurs has only one effect: that of buying time, while waiting for vaccines”. The blocking of flights? “Let’s stop them, but I don’t think this has ever stopped anyone, I say it sincerely. And among other things we don’t even know if this variant is already among us”. Variants of Sars-CoV-2, observes Crisanti, “are continuously detected and certainly every now and then some variants emerge because they have higher transmissibility characteristics than others. In South Africa the situation is complicated by the fact that there is actually an important number of people vaccinated and therefore we do not know if this variant has emerged because it is more transmissible than the Delta, or because it is able to infect also vaccinated people. It is a variant that has many mutations and certainly this is an element of concern greater”. Obviously, concludes the virologist, “we are talking only about hypotheses at the moment. We must first try to understand if this variant is susceptible to vaccines or not, if it is resistant or not. We are a phase of observation and if it will be confirmed that it resists vaccines. companies must immediately update their composition and countries must implement measures that mitigate the impact of the variant for 4-5 months, the time to update and distribute the new “shield products.” “But containment measures will need to be put in place in the case of high virulence and a variant capable of overcoming vaccines.”