COVID-19 Outbreak, Senegal, 2020

Abstract

The spread of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 began later in Africa than in Asia and Europe. Senegal confirmed its first case of coronavirus disease on March 2, 2020. By March 4, a total of 4 cases had been confirmed, all in patients who traveled from Europe.

Keywords: COVID-19; SARS-CoV-2; Senegal; coronavirus disease; respiratory infections; severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2; viruses; zoonoses.

Figure

Phylogeny of 4 severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 strains isolated from Senegal (green dots). Whole-genome nucleotide sequences were compared with 56 other genome sequences from the coronavirus disease pandemic retrieved from GenBank and GISAID (https://www.gisaid.org) databases. Sequences were aligned with MAFFT (https://mafft.cbrc.jp/alignment/server). We generated the phylogenetic tree by the maximum-likelihood method under the HKY85-gamma nucleotide substitution model using IQ-TREE (http://www.cibiv.at/software/iqtree). We assessed robustness of tree topology with 1,000 replicates; bootstrap values >75% are shown on the branches of the consensus trees. Phylogenetic analyses revealed that strains from Senegal clustered with strains from diverse origins (Europe, Asia, Latin America, and Africa). CoV, coronavirus; hCoV, human coronavirus.