Carrazco-Montalvo, A.; Herrera-Yela, A.; Alarcón-Vallejo, D.; Gutiérrez-Pallo, D.; Armendáriz-Castillo, I.; Andrade-Molina, D.; Muñoz-Mawyin, K.; Fernández-Cadena, J.C.; Morey-León, G.; USFQ-COVID-19 Consortium; CRN Influenza y OVR—INSPI; Patiño, L. Omicron Sub-Lineages (BA.1.1.529 + BA.*) Current Status in Ecuador. Viruses2022, 14, 1177.
Carrazco-Montalvo, A.; Herrera-Yela, A.; Alarcón-Vallejo, D.; Gutiérrez-Pallo, D.; Armendáriz-Castillo, I.; Andrade-Molina, D.; Muñoz-Mawyin, K.; Fernández-Cadena, J.C.; Morey-León, G.; USFQ-COVID-19 Consortium; CRN Influenza y OVR—INSPI; Patiño, L. Omicron Sub-Lineages (BA.1.1.529 + BA.*) Current Status in Ecuador. Viruses 2022, 14, 1177.
Abstract
The Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 is the latest pandemic lineage causing COVID-19. Despite having a vaccination rate ≥ 85% Ecuador recorded a high incidence of Omicron from December 2021 to March 2022. Since Omicron emerged it is evolving into multiple sublineages with distinct prevalence in different regions. In this work, we use all Omicron sequences from Ecuador available at GISAID until March 2022 and the software Nextclade and Pangolin to identify which lineages circulate in this country. We detected 12 different sublineages (BA.1, BA.1.1, BA.1.1.1, BA.1.1.14, BA.1.1.2, BA.1.14, BA.1.15, BA.1.16, BA.1.17, BA.1.6, BA.2, BA.2.3), which has been reported in Africa, America, Europe, and Asia suggesting multiple introduction events. Sublineages BA.1.1 and BA.1 were the most prevalent. Genomic surveillance must continue to evaluate the dynamic of current sublineages, early introduction of new ones and vaccine efficacy against evolving SARS-CoV-2.
Keywords
COVID-19; Omicron; Sublineages; Ecuador
Subject
LIFE SCIENCES, Genetics
Copyright:
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.