There's a new coronavirus subvariant catching the attention of global doctors and researchers: it's being called "XEC."
Experts suspect this new strain of the coronavirus could become the dominant variant in a matter of months. That sentiment was bolstered over the weekend by Eric Topol, director of the Scripps Research Translational Institute in California.
“At this juncture, the XEC variant appears to be the most likely one to get legs next," Topol wrote on X on Sunday.
According to reports, this latest variant first popped up in Germany but has been detected in roughly two dozen other countries since June.
XEC has been detected in the United States as well, but its reach so far remains low and has not circulated enough to be added to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's variant tracker.
At this juncture, the XEC variant appears to be the most likely one to get legs next. Its current status nicely tracked by @Mike_Honey_ 's threadhttps://t.co/4AnLa3MXfz
— Eric Topol (@EricTopol) September 15, 2024
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This strain is believed to be a combination of KS.1.1 and KP.3.3, the latter of which has been leading U.S. infections for some time.
The most recent COVID vaccines approved in the U.S., from Moderna and Pfizer, are designed against KP.2. Still, researchers are encouraging people to get the booster.
Dr. Elizabeth Hudson, regional chief of infectious diseases for Kaiser Permanente Southern California, told the LA Times that the latest booster can still help against XEC “because there is some overlap, because these are all sub, sub, sub-grandchildren of the original Omicron. So there is still going to be some level of protection there.”
Symptoms of XEC are said to be close to those of prior variants: fever, sore throat, cough, loss of smell and appetite, and body aches.
