TEMPORAL DYNAMICS AND GEOGRAPHIC DISTRIBUTION OF SARS-COV-2 VARIANTS IN PERU, 2020-2024

Bisbal-Mondragón G.; Alvarado-Quiroz K.D.; Cáceres-Fernández M.J.; Somocurcio-Vilchez E.S. · Revista de la Facultad de Medicina Humana (2026) · DOI: 10.25176/rfmh.v26i3.8510

Resumen

The objective was to describe the temporal and geographic distribution of SARS-CoV-2 variants recorded in Peru between 2020 and 2024. An observational, descriptive, retrospective study was conducted using 55,563 SARS-CoV-2 sequences available in GISAID. In 2020, 98.8% of the sequences corresponded to lineages not classified as variants of concern (VOCs) or variants of interest (VOIs); among the classified variants, Gamma predominated. In 2021, Delta was the predominant variant (46.1%), followed by Lambda (28.7%) and Gamma (14.6%). Omicron accounted for 99.3% of the sequences in 2022 and 100% in both 2023 and 2024. Quarterly analysis showed a shift from BA.1* and BA.2* to BA.5, XBB, and JN.1*. Lima accounted for 22,954 sequences included in the geographic analysis. The available sequences showed temporal changes and a heterogeneous geographic distribution, although they do not necessarily represent the circulation of variants throughout the Peruvian population. These findings support the need to strengthen genomic surveillance by improving geographic representation. © Artículo publicado por la Revista de la Facultad de Medicina Humana de la Universidad Ricardo Palma. Es un artículo de acceso abierto, distribuido bajo los términos de la Licencia Creative Commons: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International, CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), que permite el uso no comercial, distribución y reproducción en cualquier medio, siempre que la obra original sea debidamente citada. Para uso comercial, por favor póngase en contacto con revista.medicina@urp.pe.

Instituciones: Universidad Católica de Santa María