约翰内斯堡——南非卫生部长乔·帕赫拉周四宣布，在该国人口最多的省份豪登，一种新的冠状病毒变种被检测出，科学家称这是一个令人担忧的问题，因为它的突变数量很高，并在年轻人中迅速传播。

冠状病毒随着传播而进化，许多新的变种，包括那些令人担忧的突变，通常会消亡。科学家们监测可能的变化，这些变化可能更容易传播或致命，但要搞清楚新的变种是否会有公众健康影响可能需要时间。

法拉赫在一次在线新闻发布会上说，南非新感染病例急剧上升。

“在过去的四五天里，病例呈指数级上升，”他说，并补充说，新的变种似乎正在推动病例的激增。南非科学家正在努力确定新病例中有多少百分比是由新变种引起的。

他说，目前被鉴定为B.1.1.529的新变种也在博茨瓦纳和香港的南非旅客中发现。

世界卫生组织的技术工作组将于周五开会评估新变种，并可能决定是否给它取一个希腊字母的名字。

英国政府宣布，从周五中午(格林尼治时间12:00)开始，禁止来自南非和其他五个南部非洲国家的航班，任何最近从这些国家抵达的人都将被要求进行冠状病毒测试。

英国卫生大臣萨吉德·贾维德(Sajid Javid)表示，人们担心这种新变种“可能比占主导地位的德尔塔病毒株更容易传播”，而且“我们目前拥有的疫苗可能对其效力较低”。

南非基因组监测网络的图里奥·德·奥利韦拉说，这种新变种有一群新突变，他跟踪了三角洲变种在该国的传播。

德奥利韦拉说:“非常高的突变数量是对预测的免疫逃避和可传播性的担忧。

“这种新的变异体有很多很多的突变，”包括超过30个影响遗传性的刺突蛋白突变，他说。“我们可以看到，这种变体可能传播得非常快。我们确实预计在2010年开始看到压力健康未来几天和几周的护理系统。"

德奥利维拉说，来自南非七所大学的科学家团队正在研究这种变异。他说，他们有100个完整的基因组，预计未来几天还会有更多。

“我们对这种变异的进化跳跃感到担忧，”他说。他说，一个好消息是，它可以通过聚合酶链反应检测出来。

在一段相对较低的传播期之后，南非每天记录的新增确诊病例略高于200例，在过去一周，每日新增病例迅速增加到周三的1200例以上。周四，这一数字跃升至2465。

第一波疫情出现在比勒陀利亚和周边的茨瓦内大都会地区，似乎是该地区大学学生聚会引发的聚集性疫情健康法拉赫部长。随着病例的增加，科学家们研究了基因组测序，发现了新的变种。

剑桥大学临床微生物学教授拉温德拉·古普塔(Ravindra Gupta)说:“这显然是一个我们必须非常认真对待的变种。"它有大量的尖峰突变，可能会影响传播性和免疫反应."

古普塔说，南非科学家需要时间来确定新病例的激增是否归因于新变种。“很有可能是这种情况，”他说。“南非科学家做了一项令人难以置信的工作，他们很快发现了这一点，并让世界注意到了它。”

法拉赫说，南非官员警告说，预计12月中旬至1月初会再次出现疫情，并希望通过让更多人接种疫苗来做好准备。

大约41%的南非成年人已经接种了疫苗，每天注射的数量相对较低，不到13万，大大低于政府每天30万的目标。

南非国家卫生部代理总干事尼古拉斯·克里斯普(Nicholas Crisp)表示，南非目前有约1650万剂疫苗，由辉瑞和强生公司(Johnson & Johnson)在该国生产，预计下周还将交付约250万剂疫苗。

克里斯普说:“我们接种疫苗的速度比目前使用疫苗的速度要快。“因此，一段时间以来，我们一直在推迟交付，不是减少订单，而只是推迟交付，这样我们就不会积累和储存疫苗。”

拥有6000万人口的南非记录了290多万新冠肺炎病例，包括89000多人死亡。

到目前为止，三角洲变异体仍然是最具传染性的，并挤掉了其他一度令人担忧的变异体，包括α、β和μ。根据世界各国提交给世界上最大的公共数据库的序列，超过99%是delta。

South African scientists detect new virus variant amid spike

JOHANNESBURG -- A new coronavirus variant has been detected in South Africa that scientists say is a concern because of its high number of mutations and rapid spread among young people in Gauteng, the country's most populous province, Health Minister Joe Phaahla announced Thursday.

The coronavirus evolves as it spreads and many new variants, including those with worrying mutations, often just die out. Scientists monitor for possible changes that could be more transmissible or deadly, but sorting out whether new variants will have a publichealthimpact can take time.

South Africa has seen a dramatic rise in new infections, Phaahla said at an online press briefing.

“Over the last four or five days, there has been more of an exponential rise,” he said, adding that the new variant appears to be driving the spike in cases. Scientists in South Africa are working to determine what percentage of the new cases have been caused by the new variant.

Currently identified as B.1.1.529, the new variant has also been found in Botswana and Hong Kong in travelers from South Africa, he said.

The World Health Organization's technical working group is to meet Friday to assess the new variant and may decide whether or not to give it a name from the Greek alphabet.

The British government announced that it was banning flights from South Africa and five other southern African countries effective at noon (1200GMT) on Friday, and that anyone who had recently arrived from those countries would be asked to take a coronavirus test.

U.K. Health Secretary Sajid Javid said there were concerns the new variant “may be more transmissible” than the dominant delta strain, and “the vaccines that we currently have may be less effective" against it.

The new variant has a “constellation” of new mutations, said Tulio de Oliveira, from the Network for Genomic Surveillance in South Africa, who has tracked the spread of the delta variant in the country.

The "very high number of mutations is a concern for predicted immune evasion and transmissibility,” said de Oliveira.

“This new variant has many, many more mutations," including more than 30 to the spike protein that affects transmissibility, he said. "We can see that the variant is potentially spreading very fast. We do expect to start seeing pressure in thehealthcare system in the next few days and weeks.”

De Oliveira said that a team of scientists from seven South African universities is studying the variant. They have 100 whole genomes of it and expect to have many more in the next few days, he said.

“We are concerned by the jump in evolution in this variant," he said. The one piece of good news is that it can be detected by a PCR test, he said.

After a period of relatively low transmission in which South Africa recorded just over 200 new confirmed cases per day, in the past week the daily new cases rapidly increased to more than 1,200 on Wednesday. On Thursday they jumped to 2,465.

The first surge was in Pretoria and the surrounding Tshwane metropolitan area and appeared to be cluster outbreaks from student gatherings at universities in the area, saidhealthminister Phaahla. Amid the rise in cases, scientists studied the genomic sequencing and discovered the new variant.

“This is clearly a variant that we must be very serious about,” said Ravindra Gupta, professor of clinical microbiology at the University of Cambridge. “It has a high number of spike mutations that could affect transmissibility and immune response.”

Gupta said scientists in South Africa need time to determine if the surge in new cases is attributable to the new variant. “There is a high probability that this is the case," he said. “South African scientists have done an incredible job of identifying this quickly and bringing it to the world's attention.”

South African officials had warned that a new resurgence was expected from mid-December to early January and had hoped to prepare for that by getting many more people vaccinated, said Phaahla.

About 41% of South Africa's adults have been vaccinated and the number of shots being given per day is relatively low, at less than 130,000, significantly below the government's target of 300,000 per day.

South Africa currently has about 16.5 million doses of vaccines, by Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson, in the country and is expecting delivery of about 2.5 million more in the next week, according to Nicholas Crisp, acting director-general of the national health department.

“We are getting in vaccines faster than we are using them at the moment,” said Crisp. “So for some time now, we have been deferring deliveries, not decreasing orders, but just deferring our deliveries so that we don’t accumulate and stockpile vaccines.”

South Africa, with a population of 60 million, has recorded more than 2.9 million COVID-19 cases including more than 89,000 deaths.

To date, the delta variant remains by far the most infectious and has crowded out other once-worrying variants including alpha, beta and mu. According to sequences submitted by countries worldwide to the world’s biggest public database, more than 99% are delta.