An emerging COVID-19 variant with an extremely high number of mutations is raising concerns among public health officials.
This coronavirus variant, called BA.3.2, has been detected in half the United States and 22 other countries, according to a recently published report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The variant has as many as 70 to 75 mutations, which is at least twice as many as the JN.1 lineage viruses that have predominated in the United States over the last two years.
Threat Is Low for Now but Variant Has High Risk Potential
So far in the United States, scientists have detected BA.3.2 in nasal swabs from four travelers, three airplane wastewater samples, clinical samples from five patients, and 132 wastewater samples from 25 states, the CDC report says.
Across the U.S., levels of the new variant remain low, representing only about 0.19 percent of the approximately 2,500 total genetic sequences analyzed in national surveillance.
“I think that BA.3.2 has not shown so far that it is an immediate threat,” says Andrew Pekosz, PhD, a virologist with the division of infectious diseases at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore. “However, it is circulating and continuing to evolve so that increases the likelihood that it could change and become a more efficient virus at spreading and causing disease.”
BA.3.2 has made its mark internationally, accounting for 30 percent of samples taken in Denmark, Germany, and the Netherlands between November 2025 and January 2026, according to the CDC report.
The high number of mutations may be helping the variant evade protection from vaccination or from prior infections, which prompt the immune system to produce defensive antibodies. “The recently emerged BA.3.2 strain efficiently evades antibodies, likely because of spike protein mutations, highlighting the need for ongoing genomic surveillance and observational evaluations of vaccine and antiviral effectiveness,” write the authors of the CDC report.
The New Strain Has a Nickname, Cicada
BA.3.2 was first detected in a respiratory sample in South Africa in November 2024 but only began to spread more noticeably in 2025.
This is why some researchers have dubbed it “Cicada,” Like the insect, it seems to have spent a long period “underground” in dormancy before “coming to life” on the world stage.
Will Vaccination Protect Against Serious Illness?
At the end of last year, the World Health Organization said that currently approved COVID-19 vaccines and antivirals are expected to continue providing protection against severe disease from BA.3.2.
However, some researchers think it’s possible that vaccines may not work as well against BA.3.2. This extremely mutated variant is not considered a descendant of the JN.1 lineage, which current COVID vaccines target.
“The number of mutations makes it less likely that the current vaccines will be as highly effective against the variant,” says Robert H. Hopkins, Jr., MD, medical director of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases, “but we need more data to better answer this question.”
So far, Dr. Hopkins hasn’t seen evidence that BA.3.2 is proving to be any more harmful than other circulating variants.
“Severe sore throat is being reported as a common symptom along with other typical COVID symptoms,” he says.
The full list of COVID-19 symptoms includes:
- Sore throat
- Congestion or runny nose
- Cough
- Fever or chills
- New loss of taste or smell
- Fatigue
- Muscle or body aches
- Headache
- Nausea or vomiting
- Diarrhea
- Shortness of breath or difficulty breathing
Could BA.3.2 Drive a Summer Surge?
Whether or not the new variant continues to spread remains a question.
“It is possible we will see Cicada drive a summer COVID surge and become the dominant strain in the United States; but that is by no means certain,” says Hopkins.
Where the U.S. Stands Now With COVID
Some people still get seriously ill from COVID-19. In 2026 so far, there have been more than 3,500 deaths in the United States where COVID-19 was either the underlying cause or a contributing factor.
Flu and RSV (respiratory syncytial virus) overshadowed COVID this past season, according to Hopkins, but he urges the public to be vigilant about all of these respiratory illnesses and to get updated versions of all vaccines.
“We need to do better to protect our communities from all three of these viruses,” he says. “We did not vaccinate enough people and we did not effectively implement preventive measures, so as a result, families lost loved ones to all three viruses.”
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