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Omicron hasn’t killed anyone, WHO says, while new cases of Omicron keep popping up around the world – is it just a matter of time, or is Omicron simply milder?
WHO with positive signals on Omicron!
The World Health Organization (WHO) said there have been no deaths linked to Omikron as of Friday, but warned that it could take several weeks to determine how contagious the new COVID-19 variant is. The WHO asserts that the new variant, first detected last week in South Africa, has now appeared in 38 countries. In the United States, at least 29 cases of omicron have been reported in 11 states.
The WHO said it could also take some time to study the effectiveness of treatments and whether the disease has more severe consequences. The organization’s director of emergencies, Michael Ryan, said the goal is to “get the answers that everyone out there needs.”
Does Omicron destroy vaccine progress and immunity?
Although nearly 60 percent of Americans are fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and about 70 percent on average in Europe, there are concerns that the highly mutated Omikron variant could wipe out these advances in immunity. Dr. Anthony Fauci, President Joe Biden’s chief medical adviser, sought to allay fears about Omicron by pointing out that it spreads twice as fast as the Delta variant. At a White House briefing Friday, he said studies show that booster shots increase antibody protection against a number of variants.
He said there is “every reason to believe” that those who are vaccinated and have received booster shots “have at least some cross-protection, very likely against serious disease, even against the Omicron variant.”
Many fully vaccinated get Omicron
Most Omicron cases that have occurred in the U.S. have involved fully vaccinated people who had only mild symptoms.
However, South African scientists published a study that showed Omicron carried a higher risk of re-infection in people who contracted COVID than earlier variants.
Cases in South Africa have more than tripled in four days, while in Norway, believed to be the world’s largest outbreak, at least 60 people attending a Christmas party tested positive for the strain this week.
Dr Bruce Walker, a professor of immunology at Harvard Medical School and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said that at worst Omikron could be transmissible and more efficient at making copies of itself and therefore more dangerous.
At worst, Omikron could be transmissible and efficient at making copies of itself, and thus more dangerous. But it could also be transmissible but less dangerous and even provide protection against future infections with a similar coronavirus. “That’s just wishful thinking at this point,” Walker told USA Today.