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GENEVA: The danger posed by the omicron variant remains to be “very excessive,” the World Well being Group mentioned Wednesday, after Covid-19 case numbers shot up by 11 % globally final week.
Omicron is behind speedy virus spikes in a number of nations, together with these the place it has already overtaken the previously-dominant Delta variant, the WHO mentioned in its Covid-19 weekly epidemiological replace.
“The general threat associated to the brand new variant of concern omicron stays very excessive,” the UN well being company mentioned.
“Constant proof exhibits that the omicron variant has a development benefit over the Delta variant with a doubling time of two to 3 days and speedy will increase within the incidence of instances is seen in numerous nations,” together with Britain and the USA, the place it has change into the dominant variant.
“The speedy development fee is more likely to be a mixture of each immune evasion and intrinsic elevated transmissibility of the omicron variant.”
Nevertheless, the WHO highlighted the 29 % lower within the incidence of instances noticed in South Africa — the nation which first reported the variant to the WHO on November 24.
It mentioned early knowledge from Britain, South Africa and Denmark — which at the moment has the world’s highest fee of an infection per individual — urged there was a diminished threat of hospitalization for omicron in comparison with Delta.
Nevertheless, additional knowledge was wanted to grasp omicron’s severity when it comes to scientific markers, together with using oxygen, mechanical air flow and loss of life.
Extra knowledge was additionally required on how the severity is likely to be being impacted by earlier Covid an infection, or vaccination.
“It’s also anticipated that corticosteroids and interleukin 6 receptor blockers will stay efficient within the administration of sufferers with extreme illness,” the WHO mentioned.
“Nevertheless, preliminary knowledge counsel that monoclonal antibodies could also be much less capable of neutralize the omicron variant.”
The WHO mentioned that within the week ending Sunday, following a gradual improve since October, the worldwide variety of new instances rose by 11 % in comparison with the earlier week, whereas the variety of new deaths dipped by 4 %.
“This corresponds to simply beneath 5 million new instances and over 44,000 new deaths,” the Geneva-based group mentioned.
The best numbers of latest instances have been reported from the USA, Britain, France and Italy.
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