A total 53 cases of the new 'Mu' Covid variant have been documented in the UK, according to official figures.
The 'Mu' strain is among the latest to be officially listed as a 'variant under investigation' by the World Health Organisation (WHO) amid fears it may resist vaccine immunity.
Public Health England (PHE) released the figures tallying cases of the variant on Tuesday, which was first recorded in Colombia in January, according to i News.
The variant first emerged in the UK in May and a further five cases have been recorded in the latest update since August. No deaths have been linked to the strain.
The Mu variant, also known as B.1.621, was added to the WHO’s watchlist on Monday August 30 after it was detected in 39 countries and sparked a wave in Colombia, where it makes up four in 10 cases.
According to the WHO’s weekly bulletin on the pandemic, it was found to possess a cluster of mutations that may make it less susceptible to the immune protection from the vaccine.
Preliminary data suggests it may evade immune defences in a similar way to the Beta variant first discovered in South Africa.
However, the research is still in the early stages and needs to be confirmed by further work, the report adds.
Scientists are eager to know whether the Mu variant is more transmissible, or causes more serious disease, than the Delta variant that is dominant across the UK.
“The epidemiology of the Mu variant in South America, particularly with the co-circulation of the Delta variant, will be monitored for changes,” the WHO bulletin states.
Mu has caused some concern in the United States, where more than 1,750 cases have been recorded.
The UK's dominant strain presently remains Delta, which has continued to spread at pace despite the UK's high vaccine coverage.
The latest PHE surveillance monitoring report says genomic sequences has picked up more than 605,000 cases of Delta.
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