A potentially worrisome variant of the coronavirus detected in India may spread more easily. But the country is behind in doing the kind of testing needed to track it and understand it better.

在印度发现的一种可能令人担忧的冠状病毒变种可能更容易传播。但是，在进行跟踪和更好检测方面，印度落后了。

Yesterday, the World Health Organization designated the new version of the virus a “variant of concern" based on preliminary research, alongside those that were first detected in Britain, South Africa and Brazil but have spread to other countries.

昨天，世界卫生组织根据初步研究，将新版病毒定为“令人担忧的变种”，与那些在英国、南非和巴西首次发现但已扩散到其他国家的病毒同样可怕。

“We need much more information about this virus variant," said Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO's technical lead for Covid-19. "We need more sequencing, targeted sequencing to be done and to be shared in India and elsewhere so that we know how much of this virus is circulating.”

“我们需要更多关于这种病毒变种的信息，”Covid-19的技术负责人Maria Van Kerkhove说，“我们需要更多的测序，有针对性的测序，并在印度和其他地方分享，以便我们知道这种病毒有多少正在传播。”

Viruses mutate constantly, and the surge in infections here has resulted in more opportunities for new versions to emerge.

病毒不断变种，感染人数激增，导致变种的几率更大。

But India was slow to start the genetic monitoring needed to see if those changes were happening and if they were making the coronavirus more infectious or deadly.

但印度在监测是否有变种发生，以及这些变种是否使病毒更具传染性或更致命的监测方面进展缓慢。

Indian scientists say their work has been hindered by bureaucratic obstacles and the government’s reluctance to share vital data. India is sequencing around 1 per cent of its total cases, and not all of the results are uploaded to the global database of coronavirus genomes.

印度科学家说，他们的工作受到官僚主义和政府不愿分享重要数据的阻碍。印度正在进行测序的病例大约只有1% ，并非所有结果都上传到全球冠状病毒基因组数据库。

When there isn't enough sequencing, there will be blind spots and more worrisome mutations could go undetected until they're widespread, said Alina Chan, a postdoctoral researcher at Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard who is tracking global sequencing efforts.

麻省理工学院和哈佛大学博士后研究人员Alina Chan正在跟踪全球测序工作，她说，当测序不够时，就会出现盲点，更多令人担忧的突变可能在广泛传播之前无法被发现。

Ravindra Gupta, a professor of clinical microbiology at the University of Cambridge, said: “It has all the hallmarks of the virus that we should be worried about.”

剑桥大学临床微生物学教授拉文德拉·古普塔(Ravindra Gupta)说：“这种病毒具有我们应该担心的所有特征。”

First detected in the coastal Maharashtra state last year, the new variant has now been found in samples in 19 of the 27 states surveyed.

去年在沿海的马哈拉施特拉邦首次发现了这种新变种，现在在调查的27个州中的19个州的样本中发现了这种新变种。

Indian health officials have cautioned that it is too soon to attribute the nation's surge solely to such variants. Experts point out that the spread was catalysed by government decisions to not pause religious gatherings and crowded election rallies.

印度卫生官员警告说，现在将印度的病例激增归因于这种变种还为时过早。而专家们指出，政府决定不暂停宗教集会和拥挤的选举集会，促成了这种传播。

And now, the raging virus has infected many of the staff in the labs doing the work.

现在，肆虐的病毒已经感染了实验室里许多从事这项工作的工作人员。