Omicron

[Triển]

What we know about the omicron variant

Where has the B.1.1.529 been detected, how virulent is it and how did it develop? DW looks at what we know about the new coronavirus variant, dubbed "omicron" by the WHO.


Variant B.1.1.529 is currently spreading in South Africa


Where has the new variant been detected?

The new variant B.1.1.529, which the World Health Organization officially named omicron, was first discovered on November 11, 2021, in Botswana. That's just north of South Africa.

Since then, B.1.1.529 has also been found in South Africa. It's mainly been diagnosed in the province of Gauteng, which includes Johannesburg and Pretoria, where the incidence rates are currently about 1,200.

Scientists estimate that up to 90% of all new cases of coronavirus in Gauteng may be linked to B.1.1.529. They suggest that the new variant may have spread to eight other provinces in South Africa as well.

As of late November, elsewhere in the world, there have been three confirmed cases of the new variant.

Belgium became the first European country to confirm the presence of the new variant in a traveler returning from Egypt to Belgium.

Another traveler, who had been in South Africa, was diagnosed with the new variant in Hong Kong.

And there is one case of omicron in Israel. Two other people there are waiting for their diagnoses to be confirmed. The one person who has been confirmed as having the virus had just returned to Israel from Malawi. All three people were vaccinated.

Hundreds more are awaiting COVID test results at the Amsterdam airport as passengers from two flights from South Africa arrived after the Dutch government announced it was banning all air travel from the country earlier on Friday.

How dangerous is the new variant?

Researchers are concerned about the new variant because they say it shows an "extremely" high number of mutations of the coronavirus. They have found 32 mutations in the spike protein. By comparison, the delta variant, which is considered highly infectious, shows eight mutations.

While the number of mutations in the spike protein is not an exact indication of how dangerous a new variant is, it does suggest that the human immune system may find it harder to fight the new variant. There are indications that omicron can escape an immune response, leaving us at a greater risk.

Dr Ulrich Elling, a molecular biologist at the Institute of Molecular Biotechnology in Vienna — a laboratory that specializes in sequencing the coronavirus and detecting new variants — told DW that the first estimates indicated the new variant "might be 500% more infectious than delta."

Infections with the new variant are not necessarily more severe than infections with previous variants. But there are signs that the new variant spreads faster and that that may now put national health systems under a greater strain, faster.

What is the WHO's response?

Right now, there is simply not enough solid, epidemiological data to say how infectious the new variant is. On Friday, South Africa called for an emergency meeting of the World Health Organization to discuss the new variant.

After the meeting, the WHO classified B.1.1.529 as a "variant of concern." It gave it the name omicron, based on the Greek alphabet, as it has with other variants, such as the delta variant.

How did the new variant develop?

One theory is that the new variant emerged with all its mutations in one big burst.

Professor Francois Balloux, Chair in Computational Biology Systems at University College London, has been quoted as suggesting it's possible that the virus mutated during a chronic infection of a person whose immune system was already weakened by an untreated HIV/Aids infection.

But that is speculation at this stage.

Is there any connection with the beta variant?

Across the continent, South Africa has been hardest hit by the coronavirus. The country has had three million COVID cases and about 90,000 people have either died with or because of the virus.

The high number of COVID deaths in South Africa has been attributed to the beta variant, C.1.2. The WHO classified C.1.2. as a 'variant of concern' because it was highly infectious and vaccines were less effective against it.

But over the course of time, the delta variant, which is even more aggressive than the beta variant, has largely superceded beta in South Africa, as it has elsewhere in the world.

Can we stop the new variant?

Viruses and their variants do not respect national borders. But it is possible to slow the spread of the new variant. As the cases in Hong Kong and Israel have be traced back to southern Africa, many countries stopped flights to and from that part of the continent.

All 27 member states of the European Union agreed to temporarily suspend travel from seven southern African nations on Friday. The US also moved to restrict travel for non-US citizens from South Africa and seven other countries from Monday onwards.

Travel restrictions may help slow the spread of the variant. But since those first cases in Botswana were detected back in mid-November, and flights are only stopping now, it's conceivable that omicron has already been transported to other parts of the world.

/* source: https://www.dw.com/en/covid-what-we-...ant/a-59948143

[ốc]

Con vi trùng này chắc sẽ biến hoá dài dài, xài hết mẫu tự luôn, chuẩn bị chích ngừa, chích booster hàng năm.

Hôm qua nhớ lại mấy câu Sấm ký thì có thể mất hơn 10 năm mới hết.

Canh niên tàn phá
Tuất hợi phục sinh
Nhị ngũ dư bình

Canh niên chắc là 2020, năm Canh Tý, vậy năm Tuất, năm Hợi là 2030-2031. Nhị ngũ nghĩa là 2 lần 5.

Nói vậy thôi, muốn hiểu sai thì hiểu, y như là vịt nghe Sấm.

[Triển]

Hôm qua nhớ lại mấy câu Sấm ký thì có thể mất hơn 10 năm mới hết.

Lúc đó nó sống mình ên tự vì nhân loại đã bị tận diệt.

[Triển]

Con vi trùng này chắc sẽ biến hoá dài dài, xài hết mẫu tự luôn, chuẩn bị chích ngừa, chích booster hàng năm.

24 tây tháng Giêng năm sau có lịch hẹn booster.
Moderna. Theo thuyết âm mưu thì là năm sau
trong người mình sẽ có tổng cộng 3 miếng chips
của 3 hãng khác nhau: AstraZenecca, BioNTech
và Moderna.

[ốc]

Chích ngừa coi chừng biến thành cục nam châm. Dạo này giọng hát 5 ca sĩ hình như hơi bị rè chút xíu, có khi bị nhiễu từ trường lúc rì cọt hổng chừng.


Khúc đâu bị nhiễu từ trường
Nghe ra tiếng hát tiếng rè xen nhau
(Từ trường tân thanh)

[Triển]

Đó gọi là giọng ca có hột.

[Triển]

Theo tin tức mới cho tàu chạy ven biển
thì Omicron tuy lan nhanh nhưng có vẻ
không tàn phá lá phổi cho lắm. Người
bị lây không bị bảy chìm ba nổi. Tuy
nhiên bà con ráng cẩn thận. Bên Châu
Âu, cơ quan cấp giấy phép cho thuốc
thang EMA phát ngôn là booster 3 tháng
là được rồi. Không cần chờ tới 6 tháng.

[Ngô Đồng]

[Triển]

Coronavirus: Germany's omicron cases jump 45% in one day

The total number of omicron cases detected in Germany rose sharply with the latest figures, which were the first to provide testing results and data from a working day after the Christmas break.


Four people are confirmed to have died from the omicron variant of the coronavirus

German health authorities reported an additional 3,218 cases of the so-called omicron variant in patients in Germany on Tuesday, a jump of 45% in one day.

The Robert Koch Institute (RKI) for infectious diseases announced it had detected a cumulative total of 10,442 cases of the omicron variant.

The more infectious variant is likely to spread further, according to the RKI, and soon to become the dominant variant in the country.

Four people have died after testing positive for the omicron variant in total in Germany. Three of those were aged between 60 and 79, and one person was between 35 and 59 years old. The first omicron death was reported by the RKI on December 23.

The RKI only counts omicron cases which are verified by genome sequencing or variant-specific PCR tests. It also said that many people are on vacation and that many doctors' offices were closed in recent days over Christmas, meaning that many cases may have been undetected.

In absolute numbers, North Rhine-Westphalia accounts for the most omicron cases so far, with 3,476 cases, followed by Bavaria with 1,896 and Hamburg with 1,487.

Germany has introduced new restrictions to combat the spread of the coronavirus over winter, but restrictions are generally slightly less severe than in earlier lockdowns.

Germany's vaccination campaign has been reignited with the uptake of booster shots, thought to help protect against the omicron variant.

However, Germany has so far failed to achieve its goal of 80% vaccination rate, postponing the milestone to the end of January.

About 70% of the population, or 58.9 million people, are fully vaccinated. However, owing to probable gaps in reporting, this figure may be 5% higher, according to the RKI.

Kristine Lütke, Bundestag Member for the FDP and a member of the parliamentary health committee, said Germany's vaccination campaign would target migrants and old people in a bid to reach an 80% vaccination rate by January.

"We want the vaccination campaign to be even ... faster. And this is our aim to reach ... 80% by the end of January," she told DW.

"We have to broaden the campaign, and we do have to reach the different groups of people. Like we do have groups of migrants or we do have ... older people and we have to reach them [in] a special way, like using their language to get them where they do live, in the circumstances they work [or] live together. So we have to enforce our vaccination strategy and our campaign here."


German Epidemiologist Timo Ulrichs said he believes it is possible that the coronavirus pandemic will weaken to endemicity in 2022 as a result of population contagion and vaccination.

"It could be as early as next year that the coronavirus in the form of the omicron variant loses its pandemic potential," the scientist from Berlin's Akkon College of Human Sciences told news portal Watson.

He cited vaccine coverage and a possible fourth dose as contributing factors to it losing its ferocity.

Ulrichs cautioned, however, that should a more aggressive and different virus variant emerge, it could throw a spanner in the works.

aw/msh (dpa, AFP, Reuters)

/* src.: https://www.dw.com/en/coronavirus-ge...day/a-60280693

[ngocdam66]

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