Cuba: Two new genetic variants of SARS-CoV-2, those initially identified in South Africa and California, circulate in the Cuban province of Matanzas, confirmed last night, Fernando Acebo Figueroa, director of the local Hygiene, Epidemiology and Microbiology unit, Cubasí reports.
As Acebo Figueroa explained in a meeting of the Provincial Defense Council (CDP), the new strains of the virus that causes the disease known as COVID-19 were registered in the municipalities of Jagüey Grande, Jovellanos and Colón (South African variant), as well as in Cárdenas (Californian variant).
The presence of the latter causes, among other particularities, higher levels of contagion, lethality and dissemination of the virus, in addition to an increase in the aggressiveness of the organism, the specialist deepened in exchange with political, governmental, Public Health authorities and other sectors in the West territory.
The expert informed that the province will continue the studies to detect other possible genetic variants through the analysis of samples belonging to patients in serious or critical condition, regardless of the result obtained in the PCR test (polymerase chain reaction) in time real.
Mario Sabines Lorenzo, vice president of the CDP, warned about the need to improve quality in the processes to contain the rise of COVID-19, given the danger posed by these new strains and the one initially detected in Wuhan, which yielded the first positive in Matanzas on March 19, 2020.
The medical investigation continues among the fundamental axes of the work in the effort to raise suspicious cases in a timely manner, to later isolate them, study them and treat them medically if they ultimately prove positive for the new coronavirus, the manager alleged.
What cannot happen is that the average time between the onset of symptoms and the admission of patients is extended every day, an issue that directly influences the increase in patients who experience serious and critical stages, and even die, he stressed. .
Sabines Lorenzo recalled that as of this Wednesday the province began to implement a package of measures that seek to ensure that people spend as much time as possible at home, the only way to lower the high viral load.
Matanzas, in the phase of limited autochthonous transmission, maintains to date 296 open sources and a local transmission event in the municipality of Jagüey Grande, in addition to 619 assets and an incidence rate that exceeds 140 infected per 100,000 inhabitants.
