“Currently only 4 sequences so would recommend monitoring for now. Export to Asia implies this might be more widespread than sequences alone would imply. Also the extremely long branch length and incredibly high amount of spike mutations suggest this could be of real concern (predicted escape from most known monoclonal antibodies)”

Conserved Spike mutations – A67V, Δ69-70, T95I, G142D/Δ143-145, Δ211/L212I, ins214EPE, G339D, S371L, S373P, S375F, K417N, N440K, G446S, S477N, T478K, E484A, Q493K, G496S, Q498R, N501Y, Y505H, T547K, D614G, H655Y, N679K, P681H, N764K, D796Y, N856K, Q954H, N969K, L981F

Conserved non-Spike mutations – NSP3 – K38R, V1069I, Δ1265/L1266I, A1892T; NSP4 – T492I; NSP5 – P132H; NSP6 – Δ105-107, A189V; NSP12 – P323L; NSP14 – I42V; E – T9I; M – D3G, Q19E, A63T; N – P13L, Δ31-33, R203K, G204R

Github entry

Just spotted: very small cluster of variant associated with Southern Africa with very long branch length and really awful Spike mutation profile including RBD – K417N, N440K, G446S, S477N, T478K, E484A, Q493K, G496S, Q498R, N501Y, Y505Hhttps://t.co/kgA9c1hKDa

— Tom Peacock (@PeacockFlu) November 23, 2021

The experts are v worried by this new variant (b.1.1.529) because it has so many horrible mutations. That makes me worried. It's not yet in UK as far as I know though. https://t.co/J8Vzmlgs6O https://t.co/JpPXJfoLEi

— Prof. Christina Pagel 🇺🇦 (@chrischirp) November 25, 2021

** NOW would be a really good time to prevent B.1.1.529 from entering the UK by instituting proper border controls. We don’t have to resign ourselves to endless infections and death by new variants **

South Africa: Omicron variant B.1.1.529 has outcompeted Delta in just two weeks

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay