Washington, February 25: As per a research conducted by the Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons, a new variant of coronavirus, which share some similarities with the mutations found in South Africa and Brazil, has been on rise in US's New York City. The mutant - B.1.526- was first identified in the samples collected from New York in November, and has risen to 12 per cent by mid-February, the Columbia researchers reportedly said. However, the study has not been reviewed by external experts.

The study indicated that the new coronavirus strain is more infectious, transmissible and similar with B.1.351, the variant first identified in South Africa, and P.1., which was first identified in Brazil, as per a report in Reuters. The researchers worry as various studies have pointed out that those new variants are more resistant to some existing COVID-19 vaccines as compared to the earlier ones. New COVID-19 Strain in New York: Laboratory Confirm State's First Case of Mutant Coronavirus, Says Governor Andrew Cuomo.

It also said that the publicly available database on coronavirus shows that the South African or Brazilian variants are not found predominantly in New York. “Instead we found high numbers of this home-grown lineage,” Dr. Anne-Catrin Uhlemann, assistant professor in the division of infectious diseases at Columbia University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons, said in a statement. South African Variant of COVID-19 Could Significantly Reduce Vaccine Antibody Protection: Pfizer-BioNTech.

Earlier in January this year, the coronavirus variant that was first identified in the UK was also diecovered in the samples from New York. "An individual from Saratoga County, New York, tested positive for the strain. The individual had no known travel history," Xinhua news agency quoted the Governor Andrew Cuomo as saying in an official statement last month.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Feb 25, 2021 09:23 AM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).