A rise in Covid infections has been reported both in Singapore and in the United Kingdom, authorities have said.
Singapore’s Health Ministry said cases were up sharply, with a rise in hospitalisations, but intensive care unit (ICU) admissions remained low.
Two JN.1 variants, KP.1 and KP.2, make up more than two-thirds of Singapore’s cases, reports CIDRAP.
The Ministry said JN.1 and its sub-lineages remain dominant globally and that KP.2 is one of the variants that the World Health Organisation (WHO) recently added to its list of variants under monitoring.
In Britain, there has been a “modest “rises in cases and hospital admissions, up from very low levels.
The UK’s Health Security Agency has urged eligible people, including nursing home residents, to book vaccine boosters.
Scientists have been tracking a steady rise in JN.1 offshoots that have two added spike mutations, nicknamed the FLiRT (F for L at position 456 and R for T at position 346), which may give them more immune-evasive properties. KP.2 has the FLiRT mutations, and over the past few weeks in the United States, it topped JN.1 to become the dominant variant.
CIDRAP article – Singapore reports rise in COVID activity (Open access)
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