The Brazil variant (also known as P1) is likely to be more transmissible than previous strains of Coronavirus and able to evade immunity gained from infection with other strains, according to researchers.

The team from Brazil, the UK and University of Copenhagen estimated that "there is an aggressive variant of the coronavirus called P1 which seems to be the cause of problems" in Manaus city, Brazil.

The findings, published in the journal Science, showed that P1 is likely to be between 1.7 and 2.4 times more transmissible than non-P1-lineages of the coronavirus.

P1 was also likely to be able to evade between 10 and 46 per cent of the immunity gained from infection with non-P1 coronavirus.

For the study, the team used many forms of data from Manaus to characterize P1 and its properties including 184 samples of genetic sequencing data.

The researchers also used an epidemiological model to estimate how transmissible P1 seemed to be. As well as estimating signs of P evading immunity gained from previous infection. The model compared two different virus strains - one was the 'normal coronavirus' and the other was dynamically adjusted using machine learning to best fit the actual events in Brazil, Bhatt said.

Manaus city was hit so hard by the first wave in 2020 that it was actually thought to be one of the few places in the world to have reached herd immunity.

The massive second wave outbreak has led to many daily deaths and instances of the health care systems collapsing.

(This story was published from a syndicated feed. Only the headline and picture has been edited by FIT).