When the letters of the Greek alphabet are not enough, new strains of the coronavirus will be designated by the names of the constellations. This was stated by the head of the technical group of the emergency diseases unit of the World Health Organization (WHO) Maria Van Kerkhove in an interview with the British edition of The Telegraph.
“We probably won't have enough of the Greek alphabet, but we are already considering the next series of names, we are really considering the option with constellations,” she said.
According to her, earlier the WHO considered names using the names of ancient Greek gods and goddesses, but it was decided to abandon this option.
At the beginning of June this year, the WHO announced the decision to designate new strains of coronavirus with the letters of the Greek alphabet, so as not to discriminate against the countries where these strains were found for the first time, as well as for the convenience of using unscientific conversation. “A group of experts convened by WHO recommended the use of labeling using the letters of the Greek alphabet, that is, Alpha, Beta, Gamma,” – said in the message.
The first to report the discovery of a new, more contagious strain of coronavirus was the UK authorities in mid-December. The emergence of another strain of coronavirus was reported in March 2021 by the Indian authorities. Also, new variants of the virus have been identified in Brazil, South Africa, Vietnam and other countries.
In Russia, its own version of COVID-19 was identified in January 2021, but WHO later excluded this strain from the tracking lists.
