Emergence and Persistent Dominance of Omicron BA.2.3.7 Variant in Community Outbreaks in Taiwan

Since April 2022, waves of Omicron cases have surfaced in Taiwan and spread throughout the island. Using high-throughput sequencing of the SARS-CoV-2 genome, we have analyzed 2405 PCR-positive swab samples from 2339 individuals and identified the Omicron BA.2.3.7 variant as a major lineage within the recent community outbreak in Taiwan. ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest. ### Funding Statement This work was supported by Ministry of Health and Welfare of Taiwan (MOHW110-TDU-C-222-000010) to S.F.T., by the Research Center for Emerging Viral Infections from The Featured Areas Research Center Program within the framework of the Higher Education Sprout Project by the Ministry of Education (MOE) of Taiwan, the National Science and Technology Council (NSTC), Taiwan (NSTC 111-2321-B-182-001, 111-2634-F-182-001, and 111-2221-E-182-053-MY3), and the National Institute Of Allergy And Infectious Diseases of the National Institutes of Health under Award Number 5U01AI151698-02 to Y.N.G. and S.R.S ### Author Declarations I confirm all relevant ethical guidelines have been followed, and any necessary IRB and/or ethics committee approvals have been obtained. Yes The details of the IRB/oversight body that provided approval or exemption for the research described are given below: Ethics committee/IRB of National Taiwan University Hospital Hsin-Chu Branch gave 110-110-E ethical approval for this work I confirm that all necessary patient/participant consent has been obtained and the appropriate institutional forms have been archived, and that any patient/participant/sample identifiers included were not known to anyone (e.g., hospital staff, patients or participants themselves) outside the research group so cannot be used to identify individuals. Yes I understand that all clinical trials and any other prospective interventional studies must be registered with an ICMJE-approved registry, such as ClinicalTrials.gov. I confirm that any such study reported in the manuscript has been registered and the trial registration ID is provided (note: if posting a prospective study registered retrospectively, please provide a statement in the trial ID field explaining why the study was not registered in advance). Yes I have followed all appropriate research reporting guidelines and uploaded the relevant EQUATOR Network research reporting checklist(s) and other pertinent material as supplementary files, if applicable. Yes All data produced in the present study are available upon reasonable request to the authors