Deadly coronavirus comes in three variants, researchers find.

'Types A, B and C are all derived from the pathogen first found in bats but have evolved in different ways, according to a report by British and German geneticists.' https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3079491/deadly-coronavirus-comes-three-variants-researchers-find?utm_term=Autofeed&utm_medium=Social&utm_content=article&utm_source=Twitter#Echobox=1586611805

'Type A was closest to the coronavirus discovered in bats and although found in Wuhan was not the primary type there, they said. Type A was also found in Americans who had lived in Wuhan, and in other patients diagnosed in the  United States and Australia.'

'The most common variant found in Wuhan was type B, the study said, though this appeared not to have travelled much beyond East Asia before mutating, which the researchers said was probably due to some form of resistance to it outside that region.'

'Finally, type C was the variant found most often in Europe based on cases in France, Italy, Sweden and England. It had not been detected in any patients in mainland China, though had been found in samples from Singapore, Hong Kong and South Korea, the study said.'

'The researchers concluded that variant A was the root of the outbreak as it was most closely related to the virus found in bats and pangolins. Type B was derived from A, separated by two mutations, while type C was the “daughter” of variant B.'

'Phylogenetic network of 160 SARS-CoV-2 genomes. Circle areas are proportional to the number of taxa, and each notch on the links represents a mutated nucleotide position.'