‘More dangerous dual infection’: Patients could catch two COVID-19 strains at once

Doctors are warning of a new phenomenon of a coronavirus co-infection, with patients catching two COVID-19 strains at once, which they fear it could lead to even more variants evolving.

Patients could catch two COVID-19 strains at once, scientists say, after reports of dual infection from Brazil.

And it could lead to even more new variants evolving, with abilities to dodge vaccines and spread easier.

Amid growing concern of new variants popping up globally, doctors said they were the first to describe the phenomenon of a coronavirus coinfection.

Two people in their 30s tested positive for two Brazilian strains known as P.1 and P.2.

The patients were infected in late November with the P.2 variant of coronavirus identified in Rio.

They simultaneously tested positive for the P.1 variant of the virus which evolved separately in Manaus, which was confirmed with laboratory tests.

The patients’ symptoms were reportedly mild, with a dry cough in one case, and coughing, sore throat and headache in the second. They did not need hospital care.

Dr Fernando Spilki, a virologist at Feevale University in Rio Grande do Sul state and lead researchers, said dual infection was only likely to happen when different viruses were circulating in high numbers.

Since November, Brazil has been fighting a steep second wave of infections, routinely recording over 1000 deaths per day in 2021.

Hospitals are at capacity in the country amid a resurgence of cases caused by new strains of the virus.

The case studies reported by Dr Spilki and colleagues raise concerns among scientists that coinfection could speed up the development of new mutations, and therefore new variants of the coronavirus.

One of the ways mutations evolve is by coinfection of the same cell.

This is thought to be one way the new UK strain of coronavirus picked up a more worrisome mutation characteristic of the South African and Brazil variants.

But scientists admitted this was a “rare” way for coronaviruses to gain mutations.

Speaking on the back of the research - which has not been peer-reviewed - scientists said it was already the case that people get infected with two strains of a virus at once.

It is perfectly possible for a child attending a primary school to get infected with one variant of Covid-19, and an older sibling to attend secondary school and get infected with a different Covid-19 variant - and for both children to bring their viruses home to infect each other - and their parents with both variants, Dr Julian Tang, a professor in respiratory sciences at the University of Leicester, told MailOnline.

Professor Keith Neal, an infectious diseases expert at the University of Nottingham, said if there was a lot of transmission “you can pick up two different viruses around the same time”.

But when one strain is predominant, that is unlikely.

In the UK, the Kent variant has quickly become the most prevalent strain, however, there are others still in circulation.