New variant likely as third wave looms ahead of vaccination

The Covid-19 virus may mutate to yet another variant, with the country likely to reach a third wave of infections before the targeted population is vaccinated, say experts.

The first consignment of Covid-19 vaccine arrived in the country on Monday, with one million doses of the Covishield vaccine produced by the Serum Institute of India (SII).

Another 500,000 doses will arrive from SII later this month and two million doses from the global Covax facility by March, President Cyril Ramaphosa said this week.

While the country aimed to vaccinate 1.2 million frontline health workers in the first phase, a third wave of infections
was expected towards winter as not enough people would be vaccinated by then, said public health expert professor Alex van den Heever.

ALSO READ: Winter is coming with a third Covid-19 wave, warns expert as SA waits for vaccines

“We might be able to help some people who are likely to develop severe illness, or front-line health workers, but probably not all the vulnerable people and certainly not the general population,” he said.

The country had a large population which was still susceptible to infection as, despite probably undercounting the number of infections, many people had not had the virus, he said.

“I think it is very probable that we will experience [a third wave], certainly going towards winter because that’s a period in which people spend more time in groups indoors.

“There are still a lot of people who haven’t been infected – which is what drives the surges.”

But while the country waits for the intended herd immunity to curb transmission, the virus could mutate yet again to form a new variant, which could affect the efficacy of the vaccine .

This all depends on how fast the vaccines are rolled out, said chief executive of the South African Medical Research Council professor Glenda Gray.

“The quicker you roll-out the vaccine and limit ongoing transmission, the quicker you can control the virus,” she said.

“It is probable that eventually the vaccine might not work against a strain, but that is why we keep on making new
vaccines.

“We are probably going to have to have a [new] vaccine every year to control this. Eventually the vaccine efficacy will be reduced and we are going to have to change the vaccine.”

WATCH: SA welcomes first 1.5 million Covid-19 vaccine doses

Why a possible new strain? A virus replicates and reproduces itself, resulting in mutations and new variants.

Head of the biometric sciences department at Cape Peninsula University professor Glenda Davison explained that errors sometimes occur during the reproduction of the viral RNA or DNA, creating a change in the strand.

“These mutations of the RNA strand result in a different code and change the viral proteins,” she said.

“In most cases, these mutations have no significant impact on the function of the virus, but occasionally the changes give the virus an advantage against the body’s defence.

“The good news is that vaccines can be made to accommodate these mutations, so we don’t have to find different vaccines, but just adapt current ones.”

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