Contrasting Epidemiology and Population Genetics of COVID-19 Infections Defined by Multilocus Genotypes in SARS-CoV-2 Genomes Sampled Globally.

ABSTRACT: Since its emergence in 2019, SARS-CoV-2 has spread and evolved globally, with newly emerged variants of concern (VOCs) accounting for more than 500 million COVID-19 cases and 6 million deaths. Continuous surveillance utilizing simple genetic tools is needed to measure the viral epidemiological diversity, risk of infection, and distribution among different demographics in different geographical regions. To help address this need, we developed a proof-of-concept multilocus genotyping tool and demonstrated its utility to monitor viral populations sampled in 2020 and 2021 across six continents. We sampled globally 22,164 SARS-CoV-2 genomes from GISAID (inclusion criteria: available clinical and demographic data). They comprised two study populations, “2020 genomes” (N = 5959) sampled from Dece

SUBMITTER: Chan FHM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9316073 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature