Geneticists from Britain and Germany have mapped the evolutionary path of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19 and determined there are currently three versions of it spreading around the world.
- Types A, B and C are all derived from the pathogen first found in bats but have evolved in different ways, according to a report by British and German geneticists
- Findings show the virus has become well adapted to human transmission and mutates as it spreads, Chinese epidemiologist says
Type A was closest to the coronavirus discovered in bats and although found in Wuhan – the central China city that was the epicentre of the initial outbreak – was not the primary type there, they said.
The most common variant found in Wuhan was type B, the study said, though this appeared not to have travelled much beyond East Asia before mutating, which the researchers said was probably due to some form of resistance to it outside that region.
Finally, type C was the variant found most often in Europe based on cases in France, Italy, Sweden and England. It had not been detected in any patients in mainland China, though had been found in samples from Singapore, Hong Kong and South Korea, the study said.