London COVID Variant Missing Spike Y145 Deletion

[niman]

UK COVID variants have significant heterogeneity.  A recent (collected Dec 7) isolate from London, hCoV-19/England/LOND-12F102B/2020, has the two Spike deletions (at positions 69 and 70) as well as most of the nonsynonymous Spike changes and other mutations, including the 3 amino acid deletion in NSB 6, but does not have the Spike deletion at position 145 (Y145del), strongly suggesting rapid recombination.

Edited December 22, 2020 by niman

[CoffeeLover]

Thank you for the term “rapid recombination “because those two words are the most important to a lay person.