Italy warns about increasing Centaurus sub-variant cases

Rome, Aug 1 (Prensa Latina) The Italian health authorities on Monday warned about the possibility that the sub-variant of Omicron 2 BA.2.75, known as Centaurus, could overwhelm BA.5, current cause of most coronavirus cases in the country.

August 1, 2022
15:08

Mauro Pistello, Director of the Virology Unit of the University Hospital of Pisa, Vice President of the Italian Society of Microbiology and one of the founders of the sequencing network of the Higher Institute of health, said in statements to La Repubblica newspaper that they will know in 10-day time whether the Centaurus sub-variant is really penetrating the territory and will have the strength to undermine BA.5.

Pistello in the latest monitoring, regarding the variants of Sars-CoV-2, reported in Italy a sequence attributable to the BA.2.75 lineage, renamed by social media Centaurus.

On the other hand, Massimo Andreoni, Scientific Director of the Italian Society for Infectious Diseases, warned that “it only takes a few minutes in contact with an infected person to catch Centaurus, while with other sub-variants the times were much longer.”

Italy´s Health Ministry on Monday reported 18,813 new Covid-19 cases in last few hours, so it accounts for a significant decrease in relation to 36,966 cases reported on Sunday. pll/rgh/ort