MARSEILLE, France — French health experts and the World Health Organization are monitoring a variant that has emerged in the region, according to a new report from Bloomberg.
During a press briefing on Tuesday, WHO incident manager Abdi Mahamud said the variant has been on their radar saying, "that virus had a lot of chances to pick up."
The variant, being nicknamed IHU, was identified back in November 2021.
IHU Méditerranée Infection tweeted that the variant had been detected at its facility.
"A new COVID-19 variant has been detected at the IHU Méditerranée Infection from patients of Forcalquier. It was named the IHU variant and deposited on GISAID under the name B.1.640.2."
The variant was observed in 12 people in the southeast region of France around the same time that omicron was discovered in South Africa last year. The 12 positive cases had returned from travel in Cameroon.
It’s “too early to speculate on virological, epidemiological or clinical features of this IHU variant based on these 12 cases,” they wrote in the article.
The WHO is investigating the IHU variant, however, it has not been listed as a variant of concern.