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LMGTFY
“Viral mutations and variants in the United States are routinely monitored through sequence-based surveillance, laboratory studies, and epidemiological investigations.”
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/variants/variant-info.html?CDC_AA_refVal=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cdc.gov%2Fcoronavirus%2F2019-ncov%2Fcases-updates%2Fvariant-surveillance%2Fvariant-info.html
“Routine tests that determine whether an individual has COVID-19 do not reveal whether the disease was caused by the delta variant — mass testing of national COVID-19 samples does.”
https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2021/jul/26/facebook-posts/large-scale-not-individual-testing-tells-when-delt/
Contrary to McK1, your sample most likely will not be sequenced fully. It is extremely expensive to do that.
Instead, you will get a PCR test, which are designed to look for only specific parts of the covid genome that will tell you that it’s covid rather than another virus. These tests will pick up Delta variant with relatively high success rate. Delta contains mutations in the S gene (which encodes for spike protein) which is what is impacting the virus’s transmissibility. Most PCR tests look for some other genes instead, such as E (envelope), N (nucleoplasmid) etc. which is not where Delta has its mutations. Furthermore, most PCR tests look for more than one COVID gene to add to the robustness of the test. Source: I am a bioengineer and you can take a look at https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7345211/#!po=0.925926 (table 1 is interesting)
No. All covid variants have S gene because it encodes for spike protein which is the mechanism the virus uses to enter your cells. But because it is prone to mutations (hence the variants of concern), it is not a good candidate for diagnostic testing. Therefore, PCR tests generally look for other genes that the virus has, and these genes (E, N, RdRp etc) are present in all covid strains. New variants don’t have whole new genes. They are all the same genes with slight mutations that change their behaviors.
The collected sample is sequenced to determine whether the viral strand present in the host matches with the Delta variant. Not too different from a paternity test.
Do you have a source I can read concerning this process? I have found it difficult to find any reliable ones online.
Pro
the short answer: no normal tests can tell if what you have is the delta variant or normal (or any variant). they test for covid infections.
however, labs will sequence a statistically significant number of infections to see if the virus has the delta variant qualities, and use that as a representation of the percentage of cases that are deltas.
that’s how we know the delta variant is generally the rising/dominant strand these days.