According to the South African scientist who discovered the rapidly spreading genetic mutant, the Omicron variant now present in at least 23 countries worldwide was probably incubated in a person with an immune system affected by HIV.
Tulio de Oliveira said the emergence of Omicron in a patient unable to quickly clear the virus from his body is the “most plausible” origin story of the world’s newest dangerous variant.
Researchers in the U.S. and Europe have observed the emergence of coronaviruses with frightening mutations in patients with COVID-19 whose body’s natural defenses have been suppressed by drugs to fight cancer, autoimmune disorders such as rheumatoid arthritis, or to prevent transplant organ rejection.
De Oliveira has been warning for months that the highest probability of such mutations in sub-Saharan Africa is about 8 million people with unrecognized or poorly treated HIV. Mostly young, unvaccinated and with weakened immune systems, these people could “become a factory of options for the whole world,” he said.
In June, his team documented the appearance of more than 30 genetic changes in SARS-CoV-2 virus samples taken from a South African woman with advanced uncontrolled HIV. The mutations they observed, including several that could weaken vaccine protection and increase disease transmission, appeared within six months.
However, further study of the patient’s biosamples revealed a total of 30 genetic changes, including some that might affect how well the virus responds to vaccines or treatment.
Previously, virologists had not thought that people with HIV or AIDS would have worse results than others with immunodeficiency. After De Oliveira’s study, which went largely unnoticed in the West, research shows that while people with HIV or AIDS are not at greater risk of severe disease than other immunocompromised people, in situations such as South Africa, where many people have HIV either undetected or uncontrolled, they may be carriers of mutations and variants because the virus can survive longer in their bodies because of a suppressed immune system.
The U.S. and Europe responded to the Omicron variant by restricting travel from southern Africa, even though it had been circulating in Europe for weeks before De Oliveira raised the alarm with the WHO.
