RETRACTED: Gradual emergence followed by exponential spread of the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant in Africa
Why is this work in the frame?
A frame that forgets how it found something cannot be audited. These are the routes that admitted this work.
Post-publication record
- Nature
- Retraction
- Reason
- Contamination of Cell Lines/Tissues;Contamination of Materials;Unreliable Results and/or Conclusions;
- Date
- 12/20/2022 0:00
- Flagged by OpenAlex?
- Yes
Source: Retraction Watch, joined by DOI. OpenAlex records retraction as is_retracted, a boolean over a state space with at least four values, so it cannot express an expression of concern, a correction or a reinstatement — it reports them as false, which reads as “fine”.
Abstract
The geographic and evolutionary origins of the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant (BA.1), which was first detected mid-November 2021 in Southern Africa, remain unknown. We tested 13,097 COVID-19 patients sampled between mid-2021 to early 2022 from 22 African countries for BA.1 by real-time RT-PCR. By November-December 2021, BA.1 had replaced the Delta variant in all African sub-regions following a South-North gradient, with a peak Rt of 4.1. Polymerase chain reaction and near-full genome sequencing data revealed genetically diverse Omicron ancestors already existed across Africa by August 2021. Mutations, altering viral tropism, replication and immune escape, gradually accumulated in the spike gene. Omicron ancestors were therefore present in several African countries months before Omicron dominated transmission. These data also indicate that travel bans are ineffective in the face of undetected and widespread infection.
Fetched live from OpenAlex and de-inverted. Abstracts are not stored in this database: the inverted indexes are 8.6 GB of the frame’s 9.3 GB of text, and the host has 13 GB free.
The record
- Venue
- Science
- Topic
- SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19 Research
- Field
- Medicine
- Canadian institutions
- University of Ottawa
- Funders
- Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research, University of GhanaAfrican Academy of SciencesKwame Nkrumah University of Science and TechnologyNational Health Laboratory ServiceJomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and TechnologyFreie Universität BerlinCentre International de Recherches Médicales de FrancevilleUniversity of GhanaWorld Health OrganizationDepartment of Science and Innovation, South AfricaEuropean and Developing Countries Clinical Trials PartnershipHeinrich-Heine-Universität DüsseldorfInyuvesi Yakwazulu-NataliUK Research and InnovationPoliomyelitis Research FoundationUniversity of Salford ManchesterUniversiteit StellenboschMedical Research CouncilLondon School of Hygiene and Tropical MedicineBill and Melinda Gates Foundation
- Keywords
- TropismSevere acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)BiologyTransmission (telecommunications)VirologyGenomeTissue tropismGeneticsGeneVirusMedicineDisease
- Has abstract in OpenAlex
- yes