Covid: WHO renames UK and other variants with Greek letters

[Eugene]

Source: BBC

Covid: WHO renames UK and other variants with Greek letters

31 May 2021

The World Health Organization (WHO) has announced a new naming system for variants of Covid-19.

From now on the WHO will use Greek letters to refer to variants first detected in countries like the UK, South Africa and India.

The UK variant for instance is labelled as Alpha, the South African Beta, and the Indian as Delta.

The WHO said this was to simplify discussions but also to help remove some stigma from the names.

Earlier this month the Indian government criticised the naming of variant B.1.617.2 - first detected in the country last October - as the "Indian variant", though the WHO had never officially labelled it as such.

-snip-

Read more: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-57308592

[Ron Obvious]

1. A bit oversensitive, IMO

The regional variant names are more useful in helping avoid those strains. I know they fear discrimination, but that shouldn't be the overriding factor when it comes to life or death situations like this.

[BigmanPigman]

2. A new varient was just discovered by a Vietnamese team

of scientists. I wonder what it will be called, Epsilon?