Ahmed M Hassan, Barbara Mühlemann, Tagreed L Al-Subhi, Jordi Rodon, Sherif A El-Kafrawy, Ziad Memish, Julia Melchert, Tobias Bleicker, Tiina Mauno, Stanley Perlman, Alimuddin Zumla, Terry C Jones, Marcel A Müller, Victor M Corman, Christian Drosten, Esam I Azhar
{"title":"Ongoing evolution of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, 2023-2024","authors":"Ahmed M Hassan, Barbara Mühlemann, Tagreed L Al-Subhi, Jordi Rodon, Sherif A El-Kafrawy, Ziad Memish, Julia Melchert, Tobias Bleicker, Tiina Mauno, Stanley Perlman, Alimuddin Zumla, Terry C Jones, Marcel A Müller, Victor M Corman, Christian Drosten, Esam I Azhar","doi":"10.1101/2024.09.12.612455","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) circulates in dromedary camels in the Arabian Peninsula and occasionally causes spillover infections in humans. Due to lack of sampling during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, current MERS-CoV diversity is poorly understood. Of 558 dromedary camel nasal swabs from Saudi Arabia, sampled November 2023 to January 2024, 39% were positive for MERS-CoV RNA by RT-PCR. We generated 42 MERS-CoV and seven human 229E-related CoV by high-throughput sequencing. For both viruses, the sequences fell into monophyletic clades apical to the most recent available genomes. The MERS-CoV sequences were most similar to those from lineage B5. The new MERS-CoVs sequences harbor unique genetic features, including novel amino acid polymorphisms in the Spike protein. The new variants require further phenotypic characterization to understand their impact. Ongoing MERS-CoV spillovers into humans pose significant public health concerns, emphasizing the need for continued surveillance and phenotypic studies.","PeriodicalId":501183,"journal":{"name":"bioRxiv - Evolutionary Biology","volume":"199 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2024-09-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"bioRxiv - Evolutionary Biology","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1101/2024.09.12.612455","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"","JCRName":"","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) circulates in dromedary camels in the Arabian Peninsula and occasionally causes spillover infections in humans. Due to lack of sampling during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, current MERS-CoV diversity is poorly understood. Of 558 dromedary camel nasal swabs from Saudi Arabia, sampled November 2023 to January 2024, 39% were positive for MERS-CoV RNA by RT-PCR. We generated 42 MERS-CoV and seven human 229E-related CoV by high-throughput sequencing. For both viruses, the sequences fell into monophyletic clades apical to the most recent available genomes. The MERS-CoV sequences were most similar to those from lineage B5. The new MERS-CoVs sequences harbor unique genetic features, including novel amino acid polymorphisms in the Spike protein. The new variants require further phenotypic characterization to understand their impact. Ongoing MERS-CoV spillovers into humans pose significant public health concerns, emphasizing the need for continued surveillance and phenotypic studies.
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