SARS-CoV-2 alpha variant: is it really more deadly? A population-level observational study.
2021
Background:
In 2021 a new variant of SARS-CoV-2, which came to be called the alpha variant,
spread around the world. There were conflicting reports on this COVID-19 variant
strain9s potentially increased lethality. In Israel, this strain became predominant in a
very short time period.
Methods:
COVID-19 mortality and case fatality rates were examined in Israel in terms of weekly
and cumulative numbers.
Results:
COVID-19 case fatality rates in Israel rose quickly at the beginning of the pandemic
and peaked in May 2020. The highest crude mortality came later in the second and
third waves, but case the case fatality rates did not rise in 2021 with the increasing
dominance of the alpha variant.
Conclusions:
Based on the results of examining case-fatality and mortality rates, we concluded that
while the alpha variant of the virus raised mortality, in line with the fact that it is more
infectious than wild-type, once this strain was caught by patients in Israel, it was not
more likely to kill them than the original strain.
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