FLuQE

Have you had cold-like symptoms lately?  It could be influenza, RSV, mycoplasma pneumonia (otherwise known as micro pneumonia), walking pneumonia, whooping cough or Covid.  Or it could just be a cold. If it is Covid then it could be FLiRT but is more likely now to be FLuQE.  FLuQE is no more transmissible than FLiRT but it is new so it will cruise past our immunity systems for a while creating a wave of infection.

The name is derived from FLiRT but an additional spike protein Q493E has led to identification as FLuQE.   The additional protein allows the virus to bind to a specific protein in human cells which makes it, at the moment, more successful than the other FLiRTs.   All the FLiRT family are descendants of the JN.1 variant derived from Omicron.