The virus has been successfully cultivated and isolated in the institute's laboratory. —Photo courtesy of National Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology

HÀ NỘI — The SARS-CoV-2 virus, which has caused the COVID-19 pandemic, has evolved and divided into two different groups, according to the latest study of the National Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology.

Professor Lê Thị Quỳnh Mai, deputy director of the institute said the scientists had conducted the study after it cultivated and isolated the virus since Việt Nam recorded the first people positive with the virus.

Mai said at first, patients mostly returned from Asian countries but now the patients mostly had been in European countries.

The virus Việt Nam isolated in COVID-19 patients coming from Europe was found to be different from the virus in COVID-19 cases found in Asia, she said.

The institute's discovery followed the general trend of the world, she said.

Mai said that so far the study had yet to show which of the two was more infectious or stronger as the spread of the virus also depended on the environment, geography and person infected, but detecting the changes of the virus would aid vaccine production.

Previously, Mai and her colleagues isolated the virus in early February, making Việt Nam one of the first four countries around the globe that isolated the new strain of coronavirus. — VNS