Delta Sub-Lineage AY.4 is on the Rise in Maharashtra. Here's What Scientists Have to Say About Its Spread

The cases of AY.4, a sub-lineage of the Delta variant of coronavirus, are on the rise in India, particularly in Maharashtra, scientists have said. They, however, said it is yet to be ascertained if AY.4 is a matter of concern,

According to a Times of India report, AY.4 was found in 1% of the samples tested from Maharashtra in April as part of the Indian Covid-19 Genome Surveillance. Its proportion increased to 2% in July and 44% in August.

The Delta (B.1.617.2) was found in 111 (36%) of the 308 samples analysed from August and of these AY.4 was found in 137 samples (44%).

The latest genomic sequencing series completed in the lab last week, too, showed the presence of many “Delta derivatives”, including AY.4. “Delta and its derivatives, which were previously called Delta Plus, are not considered to be separate entities yet,” said a civic source.

The report said that a team from Mumbai’s civic body BMC is in the process of correlating the Delta reports with patients’ medical reports to understand “if and how the variants have changed Covid’s symptoms and severity”.

“A variant becomes a matter of concern only if we can establish it has increased transmissibility, causes severe infection and/or it can cause breakthrough infection,” the report quoted a doctor as saying.

On Friday, aamples sent for genomic sequencing from people infected by Covid-19 in Bengaluru were found to have three lineages Delta and its sub-lineages AY.4 and AY.12 to be dominant across age groups.

As many as 133 mutations in the spike protein were also highlighted by researchers at Strand Precision Medicine Solutions in their recent report.

It was found that 52 percent of the total samples that possessed the Delta (B.1.617.2) variant were from people aged 19 to 45. Sub-lineages AY.4 were found to be present in 34 percent and AY.12 in 13 percent. The report also claimed that the same lineages were noted among children, vaccinated individuals and those yet to be vaccinated.

“We found several new mutations at low frequency (>0.3%<4.5%) in the spike protein in the 439-446 positions, in Delta, AY.4 and AY.12. Some of these are novel and not yet reported in global databases,” researchers said.

The results were based on a total of 384 samples collected by Burhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP). Notably, the genome sequencing report comes at a time when a recent report from the Covid-19 technical advisory committee (TAC) constituted by the state government forecast the third wave of the pandemic during October-November.

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