ABSTRACT
The circulation of SARS-CoV-2 Beta (B.1.351) variants challenged the control of COVID-19 pandemic. The numbers of COVID-19 cases and deaths and SARS-CoV-2 sequences in South Africa were collected. We reconstructed the variant-specified reproduction numbers (R t) and delay-adjusted case fatality ratio (CFR) to examine the changes in transmissibility and fatality risk of Beta over non-Beta variants. We estimated that Beta variants were 41% (95%CI: 16, 73) more transmissible and 53% (95%CI: 6, 108) more fatal than non-Beta variants. Higher risks of infection and fatality might lead to increasing volumes of infections and critical patients.
Impacts
The circulation of SARS-CoV-2 Beta (B.1.351) variants, which were firstly reported in South Africa, challenged the control of COVID-19 pandemic.
Using the national-wide COVID-19 cases and SARS-CoV-2 sequences data, Beta variants were estimated 41% more transmissible and 53% more fatal than non-Beta variants in South Africa.
Higher risks of infection and fatality might lead to increasing volumes of infections and critical patients.
Ethics approval and consent to participate
The number of COVID-19 cases and deaths and SARS-CoV-2 sequences data are collected via public domains, and thus neither ethical approval nor individual consent is applicable.
Availability of materials
All data used in this work are publicly available.
Acknowledgments
The SARS-CoV-2 genetic sequences were retrieved from the global initiative on sharing all influenza data (GISAID) at http://platform.gisaid.org/ (accessed on 15 July 2021). The complete acknowledgment table could be found online via GISAID. We thank the contributions of the submitting and the originating laboratories, and colleagues for helping collected the sequences data.
Author’s contributions
Conceptualization: SZ. Methodology: SZ. Software: SZ. Validation: SZ. Formal analysis: SZ. Investigation: SZ. Resources: SZ. Data Curation: SZ. Writing - Original Draft: SZ. Writing - Review and Editing: SZ, and ZP. Visualization: SZ. Supervision: MHW. Project Administration: SZ. Funding acquisition: ZP. All authors critically read the manuscript, and gave final approval for publication.
Disclosure statement
MHW is a shareholder of Beth Bioinformatics Co., Ltd. Other authors declared no competing interests. The funding agencies had no role in the design and conduct of the study; collection, management, analysis, and interpretation of the data; preparation, review, or approval of the manuscript; or decision to submit the manuscript for publication.