As is proving to be the case in many countries, the Delta variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus is on course to become the dominant cause of Covid-19 in Mexico, according to investigators at the Instituto Nacional de Medicina Genómica (Inmegen).
Alberto Cedro Tanda, Inmegen’s coordinator of genomic sequencing, told the national daily Milenio that the variant is already the most dominant strain in Mexico City, where it represented 3.8 percent of the total Covid-19 samples sequenced in May, but shot up to 66.7 percent in the first two weeks of June.
Nationally, Delta represented 2.9 percent of samples sequenced in May, increasing to 16.5 percent in the first two weeks of June.
The World Health Organization says that Delta, first identified in India, has the potential “to be more lethal because it’s more efficient in the way it transmits between humans and it will eventually find those vulnerable individuals who will become severely ill, have to be hospitalized and potentially die.”
Data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) showed that in the United States the Delta strain more than doubled in the first half of June to just over 20.6 percent of positive Covid-19 test samples genetically sequenced.
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