A SARS-CoV-2 mutant from B.1.258 lineage with ∆H69/∆V70 deletion in the Spike protein circulating in Central Europe in the fall 2020.

"Declarations Conflict of interestMultiplexDX, s.r.o. has developed and manufactured the B.1.1.7 differential RT-qPCR assay kit. Biomedical Research Center of the Slovak Academy of Sciences has entered into collaboration with MultiplexDX, s.r.o. for development and validation of RT-qPCR tests. All other authors declare no competing interests. Ethical approvalAll clinical specimens used within this study were previously collected for the purpose of primary diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2 by the Regional Authority of Public Health, Trenčín, Slovakia and were transferred to the Biomedical Research Center of the Slovak Academy of Sciences, Bratislava, Slovakia while made unidentifiable for the researchers performing this study. The study has been approved by the Ethics committee of Biomedical Research Center of the Slovak Academy of Sciences, Bratislava, Slovakia (Ethics Committee Statement No. EK/BmV-02/2020). Conflict of interest MultiplexDX, s.r.o. has developed and manufactured the B.1.1.7 differential RT-qPCR assay kit. Biomedical Research Center of the Slovak Academy of Sciences has entered into collaboration with MultiplexDX, s.r.o. for development and validation of RT-qPCR tests. All other authors declare no competing interests."

"Funding Our research was supported by Grants from the Slovak Research and Development Agency (APVV-18-0239 to JN, PP-COVID-20-0017 to BK, and PP-COVID-20-0116 to PC and BK), the Scientific Grant Agency (VEGA 1/0463/20 to BB, VEGA 1/0458/18 to TV), and the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation program (EVA-GLOBAL Project #871029 to BK and PANGAIA Project #872539). The research was also supported in part by OPII project ITMS2014: 313011ATL7."