Genomic characterization of SARS-CoV-2 in Guinea, West Africa

Mamadou Saliou Sow, Josue Togo, Lacy M. Simons, Souleymane Taran Diallo, Mohamed Lamine Magassouba, Mamadou Bhoye Keita, Anou Moise Somboro, Youssouf Coulibaly, Egon A. Ozer, Judd F. Hultquist, Robert Leo Murphy, Almoustapha Issiaka Maiga, Mamoudou Maiga, Ramon Lorenzo-Redondo*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

SARS-CoV-2 has claimed several million lives since its emergence in late 2019. The ongoing evolution of the virus has resulted in the periodic emergence of new viral variants with distinct fitness advantages, including enhanced transmission and immune escape. While several SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern trace their origins back to the African continent—including Beta, Eta, and Omicron–most countries in Africa remain under-sampled in global genomic surveillance efforts. In an effort to begin filling these knowledge gaps, we conducted retrospective viral genomic surveillance in Guinea from October 2020 to August 2021. We found that SARS-CoV-2 clades 20A, 20B, and 20C dominated throughout 2020 until the coincident emergence of the Alpha and Eta variants of concern in January 2021. The Alpha variant remained dominant throughout early 2021 until the arrival of the Delta variant in July. Surprisingly, despite the small sample size of our study, we also found the persistence of the early SARS-CoV-2 clade 19B as late as April 2021. Together, these data help fill in our understanding of the SARS-CoV-2 population dynamics in West Africa early in the COVID-19 pandemic.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Article numbere0299082
JournalPloS one
Volume19
Issue number3 March
DOIs
StatePublished - Mar 2024

Funding

Funding: Funding for this work was provided by: Catalyser from the Institute for Global Health of Northwestern University (M.S.S., M.M., J.T., A.M. S., and A.I.M.,); a Dixon Translational Research Grant made possible by the generous support of the Dixon Family Foundation (E.A.O. and J.F.H.); two COVID-19 Supplemental Research awards from the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH’s) National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS; UL1 TR001422 – J.F.H., and UL1 TR002389 – J.F.H., E.A.O., R.L.R.); a supplement to the Northwestern University Cancer Center (P30–CA060553 - J.F.H.); the NIH-supported Third Coast CFAR (P30 AI117943 – R.L. R., J.F.H.); NIH grant R21 AI163912 (J.F.H.); NIH grant U19 AI135964 (E.A.O.); and through a generous contribution from the Walder Foundation Foundation’s Chicago Coronavirus Assessment Network (Chicago CAN) Initiative (J.F.H., E.A.O., R. L.R.). The funding sources had no role in the study design, data collection, analysis, interpretation, or writing of the report.

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • General

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