COVID-19: The mutation clue that helped determine Canucks’ P.1 variant

3 years ago  /  The Province Hockey  /  Read Time: 1 minute 53 seconds

The power of deductive reasoning likely led the Vancouver Canucks and local health officials to the preliminary conclusion that they were dealing with the COVID-19 variant first identified in Brazil (P.1).





Team and National Hockey League sources began telling reporters last weekend that the team’s working theory was that they were dealing with the P.1 variant, which has been reported in B.C. for weeks now, most notably due to an outbreak earlier this month in Whistler.





This is in comparison with the variant first identified in the U.K (B.1.1.7), which is responsible for most of the variant cases currently active in the province. Those cases are concentrated in the Fraser Health region, provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry noted recently.





And while genetic sequencing hasn’t yet fully confirmed that the variant is P.1, the process the B.C. Centre for Disease Control uses to screen PCR nose swab tests for COVID-19 variants would have revealed some pretty strong clues quickly.





When the familiar nose-swab test returns a positive result, analysis in the following day or two can reveal the tell-tale mutations of variants like B.1.1.7, P.1 and the variant first identified in South Africa (B.1.351), the three variants of concern that have been seen in B.C.,





the BCCDC’s Dr. Catherine Hogan said in an online presentation on March 30





.





As part of her presentation, Hogan said that while all three variants share a similar mutation that can be found in the initial screening of a positive PCR test, both P.1 and B.1.351 share a second mutation that shows up in the screening process.





If a swab shows it only has the first mutation, not the second, it is now presumed to be a B.1.1.7 case. If it has two mutations, it is sent for further sequencing to confirm which variant it is. That process hasn’t apparently been completed, according to comments from Dr. Jim Bovard, the Canucks’ primary team physician, on Friday.






COVID-19: Canucks’ outbreak a story about the importance of masks
Patrick Johnston: Bet on the ‘Canucks’ finishing their full schedule, one way or another






But given that there are currently no active cases of B.1.351 in the province, it was almost certain that the cases the Canucks were dealing with were P.1, just off the information they would have had from the PCR screening done last week.





That the virus spread so quickly through the Canucks’ players and coaching staff isn’t a surprise either, given that P.1 has been found to be as much as 2.5 times more transmissible than previous variants of the coronavirus.





pjohnston@postmedia.com





twitter.com/risingaction












Get the latest COVID-19 news delivered to your inbox weeknights at 7 p.m. by





subscribing to our newsletter here





.












CLICK HERE to report a typo.





Is there more to this story? We’d like to hear from you about this or any other stories you think we should know about. Email vantips@postmedia.com. ...

Read Full Article.