According to Watzl, the virus can multiply over many weeks in people with a weakened immune system. “Thereby isolated mutations can occur again and again, which may not bring the virus any benefitwhich, however, can continue to multiply due to the lack of control by the immune system. “
“The many mutations speak for development in HIV patients,” said SPD health expert Karl Lauterbach already tweeted on Friday. Compared to the original Sars-CoV-2 from Wuhan, Omikron has an unusually high number of around 30 amino acid changes in the spike protein alone. These include mutations that are known to be associated with greater transmissibility and Immunescape. There are also many mutations, the meaning of which is still unclear. “Even if we know or can estimate the effect of individual mutations from the other variants, it is currently unclear what effect this combination of mutations will have,” explained Watzl.
Many HIV patients in Africa are not being adequately treated, which is why their immune system is significantly weakened, said Watzl. In order to avoid the spread of such extensively modified variants as Omikron, it would therefore be important to identify infected people with weakened immune systems and to isolate them until they are no longer infectious. “Because even if the virus mutates strongly in such a person, only the transmission of the mutated virus is really dangerous.”