MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Cypriot scientists report new “Deltacron” version of SARS-CoV-2

No international health authority has so far recognized or designated the Deltacron variant.

Cypriot health researchers have warned about the existence of yet a new variant of SARS-CoV-2, known as “Deltacron,” a combination of the relatively new Delta and Omicron strains. According to the scientists, the new variant has the omicron genetic signature and the delta genomes.

So far 25 cases of the new “hybrid” version have been detected. “Currently there are coinfections of Omicron and Delta. We have found a variant that is a combination of both,” explained Leondios Kostrikis, professor of Biology at the University of Cyprus and director of the Laboratory of Biotechnology and Molecular Virology.

Kostrikis and his team highlighted also explained that Deltacron is more frequent in patients hospitalized after having contracted COVID-19 than in non-hospitalized positives.

Samples from 25 detected were sent to the Gisaid international database of the Pasteur Institute, in charge of publishing the official sequencing of the new variants of influenza and coronavirus.

According to media reports, Kostrikis and his team have identified 25 cases of ‘Deltacron’ in Cyprus so far. The findings were sent to Munich-headquartered GISAID, a body established in 2008 to provide open access to genomic data of influenza viruses.

But so far no international health authority has recognized or designated the Deltacron variant. While a detailed study is yet to be done on how the new Deltacron variant will impact the world, Kostrikis has said that “we will see in the future if this strain is more pathological or more contagious or if it will prevail” over delta and omicron, he said. But his personal view is that this “new strain is likely to be displaced by the highly contagious Omicron variant.”

Some virologists say that Deltacron is not a new variant as it cannot be traced or plotted on a phylogenetic tree of SARS-CoV-2 viruses. In a tweet, virologist Tom Peacock said, “The Cypriot 'Deltacron' sequences reported by several large media outlets look to be quite clearly contamination - they do not cluster on a phylogenetic tree and have a whole Artic primer sequencing amplicon of Omicron in an otherwise Delta backbone.”

Meanwhile, Cyprus Health Minister Michalis Hadjipandelas has said that the new “variant” is not something to worry about at this moment.