The novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has claimed lots of lives, posing a dire threat to global health. It was predicted that the coronavirus outbreak in the African population would be very lethal and result to economic devastation owing to the prevalence of immune-compromised population, poverty, low lifespan, fragile health care systems, poor economy, and lifestyle factors. Accumulation of mutations gives virus selective advantage for host invasion and adaptation, higher transmissibility of more virulent strains, and drug resistance. The present study determined the severe acute respiratory syndrome-2 (SARS-CoV-2) genomic variability and the contributory factors to the low COVID-19 fatality in Africa. To assess the SARS-CoV-2 mutational landscape, 924 viral sequences from the Africa region with their sociobiological characteristics mined from the Global Initiative on Sharing All Influenza Data (GISAID) database were analyzed. Mutational analysis of the SARS-CoV-2 sequences revealed highly recurrent mutations in the SARS-CoV-2 spike glycoprotein D614G (97.2%), concurrent R203K, and G204R (65.2%) in the nucleocapsid phosphoprotein, and P4715L (97.2%) in the RNA-dependent RNA polymerase flagging these regions as SARS-CoV-2 mutational hotspots in the African population. COVID-19 is more severe in older people (> 65 years); Africa has a low percentage of people within this age group (4.36%). The average age of the infected patients observed in this study is 46 years with only 47 infected patients (5.1%) above 65 years in Africa in comparison to 13.12% in countries in other continents with the highest prevalence of COVID-19. Africa’s young generation, the late incidence of the disease, and adherence to public health guidelines are important indicators that may have contributed to the observed low COVID-19 deaths in Africa. However, with the easing of lockdown and regulatory policies, daily increasing incidence in most countries, and low testing and sequencing rate, the epidemiology and the true impact of the pandemic in Africa remain to be unraveled.

中文翻译：

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SARS-CoV-2 基因组变异和预期寿命在非洲 COVID-19 传播和低死亡率中的贡献作用

新型冠状病毒病 (COVID-19) 夺去了许多人的生命，对全球健康构成了严重威胁。据预测，由于免疫功能低下人口、贫困、低寿命、脆弱的医疗保健系统、经济不景气和生活方式因素的普遍存在，冠状病毒在非洲人口中的爆发将是非常致命的，并导致经济破坏。突变的积累为病毒提供了宿主入侵和适应的选择优势、更强毒株的更高传播率和耐药性。本研究确定了严重急性呼吸系统综合症 2 (SARS-CoV-2) 基因组变异性以及导致非洲 COVID-19 死亡率低的因素。为了评估 SARS-CoV-2 突变情况，分析了来自非洲地区的 924 个病毒序列及其从全球共享所有流感数据倡议 (GISAID) 数据库中挖掘的社会生物学特征。SARS-CoV-2 序列的突变分析显示 SARS-CoV-2 刺突糖蛋白 D614G（97.2%）、核衣壳磷蛋白中的并发 R203K 和 G204R（65.2%）以及 P4715L（97.2%）中的高度重复性突变依赖于 RNA 的 RNA 聚合酶将这些区域标记为非洲人群中的 SARS-CoV-2 突变热点。COVID-19 在老年人（> 65 岁）中更为严重；非洲这一年龄组的人口比例较低（4.36%）。本研究中观察到的感染患者的平均年龄为 46 岁，非洲 65 岁以上的感染患者只有 47 名（5.1%），而非洲为 13 名。在其他大洲 COVID-19 流行率最高的国家/地区为 12%。非洲的年轻一代、该病发病较晚以及遵守公共卫生指南是重要指标，可能是导致非洲观察到的 COVID-19 死亡率较低的原因。然而，随着封锁和监管政策的放松，大多数国家的发病率每天都在增加，检测和测序率较低，非洲大流行的流行病学和真正影响仍有待解开。