Want to know how COVID-19 subvariants are behaving in Alberta? Now it’s a bit easier – CBC

The BQ variants now account for 75 per cent of sequenced cases and XBB.1.5 is on the rise

Feb 27, 2023

Albertans now have access to more detailed information on the COVID-19 variants circulating in the province.

Alberta Health’s COVID information website recently started publishing a more nuanced breakdown of the subvariants being picked up, how common they are and trends over time.

“Across Canada [Alberta has] been one of the best in keeping track of the changes and making that publicly available,” said University of British Columbia evolutionary biolgoist and COVID-19 modeller, Sarah (Sally) Otto.

The change comes after the provincial lab stopped screening all positive samples for specific variants in early February. It’s now focused solely on its practice of running a subset of cases through full genome sequencing.

Read more: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/alberta-covid-subvariants-1.6759710